


The Substance of Human Survival

by InfiniteCalm



Series: Human Survival [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, Boys In Love, Canon-Typical Violence, Death, Hogwarts, Homophobia, M/M, POV Female Character, Quidditch, Quidditch World Cup, War, anti gay laws as one of two plot points, for one chapter, love generally wins, rom-com meets war movie, why do i do what i do
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-11
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-11-12 21:43:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 29,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11170662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InfiniteCalm/pseuds/InfiniteCalm
Summary: Oliver + Percy, dealing with, among other things: hormones, quidditch, strict anti-gay legislation, the corrosive effects of homophobia, all out war, and the internal politics of a sprawling civil service.





	1. School

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys, how are we all doing, doing my best to contribute to this pairing- one of two from the Potterverse I care about. I don't think that it's too bad, warning wise- homophobia is a theme throughout the work, so watch out for that, I guess. And lots of people die and I have not proof read this and I just made up characters when I felt like it and I got very frustrated with how the government is supposed to be run- what's up, democracy??? Jeez. Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

“You can’t set up a jogging club,” Percy sighs, quill poised neatly in between two words. “There’re dementors all over the grounds.”

  
“Oh.” Oliver says. “Are they always around? Surely we’re allowed outside, this year.”

“Of course you’re allowed outside.” Percy says. “That’s not the problem. It’s that we can’t- you know, it’s difficult to exercise when you feel sad.”

“I think it’s ridiculous,” Oliver says. “I got a letter, you know, from the school, telling me about the new regulations for booking the quidditch pitch. I mean, for fuck’s sake. There’s no point at all to the system now; What if you need an extra session? Like sometimes you need a session because your players are shit- what then? We go and let the House down in front of everyone, do we? That’s surely not very- what is it, the cunting words they used- och, something something for the benefit of all… It’s not for the fucking benefit of the team, anyway, it’s our last chance to win as we fucking are, let’s not kid ourselves and say that your brothers will stay for their NEWTS- we have to win this year and those dirty great fucking bats’ll fuck it all up for us.”

“There is a mass-murderer on the loose,” Percy says, prim, pushing his glasses up his nose and pretending to be concentrating on his work. “They’ll surely be gone by Christmas. The Ministry will catch him.”

“Those cunts couldn’t catch a chocolate frog out of the fucking box it came in” Oliver mutters, darkly. “Honest to God though Percy, is it not very fucking weird that they’re here at all? It’s a fucking school- my ma was honest to Jesus shocked, you don’t get prison guards to mind a school, after all, they should all be in fucking Azkaban- mind you, you lot down south have some funny ideas about prisons- we can see Azkaban from our house on a clear day- not that it’s ever a clear day- the weather’s been shit this Summer, fucking sick of it, one sunny day down in London and then back up to fucking Scotland, but anyway, I reckon if you lot could all see Azkaban from your own houses you wouldn’t be so happy to fucking ship everyone off there, it’s a real shithole…”

“Honestly,” Percy says. “Please don’t swear like that in front of the first years.”

“Do you see any of the wee shits around? They’ve all heard far worse, I can fucking tell you. Oh, for fuck’s sake, Percy, I’m not being serious- believe me, I wouldn’t fucking swear in front of McGonagall. She’d fucking kill me.”

“Good,” Percy says, absently twisting the frayed cuffs of his jumper. “How was your Summer? They’ve changed the colour on your badge.”

“It was grand. My cousins came over from Donegal. We drank a lot in a field and accidently transfigured a cow into a wee earring, had to find the fucking thing and change it back. Did you see the league? You’re a cannons fan, aren’t you? Tragic, Weasley, tragic. Pemberley did better than expected, I thought, but really it was wrong of them to play McGregor out like that, and really Taylor is not a good manager, and the money he’s on, it’s insane, but I suppose third’s not bad. Obviously Puddlemere were fucking robbed, the last referee decision was fucking insane, I said that they should get a tribunal to look into it, that ref must have been off his fucking tits or something, but at least we haven’t been relegated, not like you, really, what did you ever do to be born into a Cannons house?”

“I think we’re in for a shot to get back into the league next year,” Percy says. “We went on holiday for a week, such a waste of time. I mostly worked on the NEWTS, you know, getting notes together and things. I’m going to be so busy this year; there’s no time to be disorganised. I invented my own system, look, it’s all the subjects here, and red is for when we have tests, and green is for the spells that I need to work on, then, and see, the cyan is for meetings- oh, look, we have one together on Wednesday the eighth, that’s nice- it’s with McGonagall, I suppose it’s just about the dementor situation- and then just blue for normal homework- not that there is normal homework, this year…”

“I suppose you’re wanting to go to some poncy Southern school”, Oliver says. “WizBridge or some shit like that.”

Percy’s ears turn a delicate shade of pink and he runs his hand through his short red hair, glasses slipping down his nose again. His face has grown up over the Summer, Oliver thinks. He looks older now; the glasses suit him much more than they used.

“Um,” He says. “Well, I was thinking of just heading into the Ministry, and saving up for a while.”  
Oliver cringes; he remembers Percy’s badly-hidden pride at the fact that his first-year schoolbooks were only second-hand, the right editions; the way he keeps looking at and making sure everything he owns is well kept and clean so as to minimise the scruffiness; he’s often mentioned that the legislation prohibiting minors from doing magic outside school has meant that he can’t get Summer jobs.

“The Ministry? Why on Earth would you bother even doing your homework? Head boys always get the Ministry jobs.” Oliver is half-joking; he thinks that it’s enough to diffuse the situation.

Katie Bell is snoring in the opposite side of the carriage; she’s always snoring. Alicia left her in here as if she were some sort of handbag or something. They fall into a comfortable silence, Oliver eating the sandwich his mother packed and about to start on the crisps, when the train grinds to a halt.

Percy stands almost immediately- he goes to the door of the carriage and peeks out. Oliver stares out the window of the train. They’re probably half-way there; they look to be on the middle of the Yorkshire moor. That’s just fucking wonderful. He’s about to say so- or maybe to comment on the fact that Katie hasn’t even woken up- and Percy’s already going about and being himself, saying things to sceptical children like “Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure they’ll get this sorted out in no time,” or “Everyone back into their compartments now, chop chop, don’t crowd the corridors!” Having him known him this long, Oliver is pretty sure that he doesn’t really know what he’s doing. Still, it’s effective. Everyone’s back inside their compartments within five minutes; this is, he supposes, a blessing, because barely a minute later it comes up the aisle.

He’s immediately reminded of the day that both his grandparents died in the fire last year, and the time that he left his broom on the landing to mess with Anna but she tripped and fell down the stairs and broke her arms- and, then, on top of all of that, the shame he thought he’d left behind a long time ago; and the desperation when he first realised; and the loneliness that comes with being the way he is, these days. It’s so awful; he feels like he’s going to be sick. I’m never going to find anyone, he thinks desperately; I’m terrible at quidditch and nobody could ever love me and we lost, last year, even though I try, and it’s because I’m crap.  
He glances up and Percy is staring at his shirt sleeve, worrying it, twisting the button on the cuff of the shirt that looks nearly new. It occurs to him that the sudden wave of uncharacteristic horror is probably not only affecting him.

“There’s one of them on the train”, he says, and Percy looks up in bleak surprise. “Why?”

“Oh.” Percy says, like he’s dragging something deep out of his throat. “That makes sense.” He shakes himself a little. “Oh God, that was awful. I- poor Ginny, she must be feeling dreadful, I should go find her- I heard chocolate helps. Do you have any on you?”

“Katie probably does,” Oliver says, taking Katie’s schoolbag from beside her. He lets out a shaky laugh. “Look, she’s still asleep. Here, yes, it’s in the front pocket- don’t fucking look at me like that, Percy, she’d want you to have it, you look dreadful.”

Oliver is reluctant to let Percy go out and find Ginny alone; it’s clear when the fucking thing leaves- like the sun came out- but still they’re a bit shaky.

“If we go from compartment to compartment”, Percy suggests. “To make sure that everyone knows what they’re doing.”

From his vantage point, trudging along behind the head boy as he mistakes pompous tones for reassuring ones, Oliver Wood appreciates two things about Percy Weasley- firstly, that he’s been exercising or something over the Summer, because he did not look that good in his school uniform in June, and secondly, that he may not be wasted in a career in the Ministry after all. He tries to talk to Ginny but she’s with her friends; Oliver can hear her “oh my God Percy you are such a prat” from outside the compartment. He’s already at their communication standards.

“She’s fine,” Percy says, straightening his collar as he ducks his head out the door.  
_

Oliver is not ashamed to admit that he full on cries the day he wins the house cup. He weeps like a baby. He’s a good few drinks in, though, in fairness to him; he wouldn’t have cried otherwise. Well, maybe not, anyway; it’s sad that Grandda won’t see him with it; he and his Grandda were the only ones who really cared enough about quidditch to any reasonable extent within the family. He’d be very proud, Oliver thinks glumly, and that’s probably when the tears start. Fred and George pick him up and carry him around the room on their shoulders, with everyone cheering. He doesn’t know where the cup went and he doesn’t much care at this point. The bumping up and down his stirring something unpleasant in his stomach.

“It’s all downhill from here, mate!” they say, at the same time, as the tip him off their shoulders onto a free sofa.

“Where’s your brother?” Oliver asks, as he dries his eyes on steady ground, trying to quell the nausea that comes from dropping a metre while drunk.

“Probably losing us hundreds of points” Fred shrugs, at the same time as George replies “He’s baiting Sirius Black by painting Potter’s face all over the Castle Walls.”

“I meant your other brother, you-” Oliver says, folding his arms. Fred throws a hand over Oliver’s mouth.

“There’ll be no need for that kind of language here, Mr. Wood.” He says.

“Why’d you want to know?” George asks, lazily. “Asleep, probably. Oh, no- there he is. By himself. That’s just pathetic, that is.”

Oliver licks Fred’s hand to escape.

“Whatever does it for you, Oliver!” Fred shouts, and then they probably go to set fire to something.

Percy is staring off into the distance when Oliver arrives.

“Hi,” Oliver says, waving a hand in front of his face, “Earth to Percy.”

“Oh,” Percy says. “Sorry. I was just tired. This is… it’s quite a loud party.”

“Let’s hope that cunt Black doesn’t turn up again.” Oliver says. “I could do without that.”

Percy had been white, that night; Ron angrily snapping at him eventually that God, he was fine. So much had needed doing; Oliver had been sober but most of the team (contrary to his explicit and thoroughly explained orders) had been quietly drunk and difficult to manage. Anna had cried into his shoulder so that nobody could tell there were tears on her face. All in all, it had ruined the party.

“Really? I thought it added a lot to the atmosphere. You know, everyone singing and then being afraid that they were going to be murdered. The quintessential Hogwarts experience.” Percy says, drily; Oliver laughs, surprised and delighted at the joke.

“Most exciting thing to happen to me for a long time. Well, before this. My beautiful team. My beautiful, beautiful team.” Oliver says, dreamily, staring out into the middle distance.

“You are all quite good looking,” Percy says, matter-of-factly. “Unusual, for a Quidditch team.”

Oliver stills. His initial reaction is outrage (How dare he), but the silence that follows feels- taut, somehow.

“You have been fucking drinking, I fucking knew it. Alone? Jesus Fucking Christ mate, that’s not a good sign. Exam stress getting to you? Well, then, who is it? Is it Alicia? Alicia doesn’t fancy you, just so’s you know, but I think if you really tried, she’s the – the girl that’d-” Oliver says, hoping maybe talking loudly would cover the fact that he’s blushing, and his heart is sitting somewhere near his tonsils, and yet for some reason he trails off, can’t finish that sentence, because Percy is looking back at him now, eyes blue and fucking- looking at him, his mouth doing a weird thing, turning down at the corners but not sad. Oliver’s mouth is dry and he can’t move, he only wants to- and Percy is half in shadow, half lit by the fire and fucking unbelievably gorgeous. Or. No. Not gorgeous. Surely he has not fucking thought that sentence.

“It’s not any of the girls,” Percy says, voice low, and then he breaks whatever is happening by laughing unconvincingly. “You’re smashed, Oliver. Let me get you some water.”  
Oliver is half convinced he would die of embarrassment were that to happen, so instead he jumps up onto a table and starts trying to get Niamh Flynn to sing something because she always does and she’s very good, so it’s always good for a laugh. He hurls himself off the table as soon as she agrees, and dances around a bit, and that’s why is heart is racing. Because he’s running around. And Hell, he is drunk. Very drunk. Who’s to say he’ll even remember any of this tomorrow? He feels like he’s just jumped into a swimming pool. Percy is sitting on the edge of the top of a sofa, looking forlorn as the party begins to escalate into something he has no control over. Oliver tries very hard not to meet his eyes, but he can’t help it, and whenever he does it’s like- whoosh- and anyway, he’s currently trying to force anyone under the age of fourteen to bed, just to feel like maybe this won’t be the end of the world- of course he’s forgotten that some of his siblings are in that bracket, and so it’s all doomed; every effort he makes is undermined by Fred and George. Still, you’ve got to admire him for trying. Oliver tries desperately to ignore him.

Niamh finishes her songs- she’s learned a few new ones, they’re very new, he hasn’t even heard them that much on the wireless- and then hops down, and she’s looking at him and holding his eye. He knows what that means from her because they’ve done this once or twice before- she knows what she wants, etc- usually he is down for that, and it’s really not like they like each other that much at all. She was remarkably succinct when they first started- this is because I like Freddie King in Hufflepuff- and that is not a problem with Oliver. It’s fun. He supposes it’s fun. He has no interest in it tonight, though.

“How’s it going, Oliver?”

“Not too bad, Niamh.” He says. “How’s Freddie?”

“Freddie’s getting the message. He’ll ask me out next week for sure.”

“Why don’t you just ask him out?”

“Eat a dick, Wood, there’s no fucking way I’m doing that. He’ll think I’m aggressive.”

“Maybe. Not if you keep on singing like that.” Oliver smiles, keeping it breezy, trying to work out what she wants from the conversation, mind straying again to Percy, even though he is really trying to focus on anything else.

“Oh, you like my singing, do you?” Niamh says, with that edge to her voice, and Oliver is wondering if it would not just be fucking easier to just go along with her, one last time, maybe it’ll take his mind off things (though he doubts it) and she’s just about to grab onto his wrist when McGonagall enters the room and silence falls.

“Everyone is to be in their beds- their own beds, Mr. Weasley”- Oliver whirls around, heart pumping, but it’s just Fred with Angelina in the corner- “in fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes. Is that clear? And if I come up here in that time and I find any evidence of illicit substances- what’s so funny, Lee? - then I will not hesitate to send you all to detention. Understood? Somebody help your Captain, by the way. He looks a little worse for wear. I’m sure I’ll see you all at breakfast tomorrow. Well done on winning.” She turns towards the portrait hole again. Oliver relaxes and is about to turn back to Niamh, when the lights go up and he feels a hand at his elbow.

“We have fifteen minutes!” Percy shouts to the rooms at large. He knows how to project, anyway. He stares some second years down, and they relent.

“Fucking no need to cunting shout”, Oliver says, rubbing his ear, feeling nauseous again.

“Do grow up, Oliver.” Percy sighs. “Come on. Can you do the steps?”

Oliver can do the steps. He sprints up the stairs, two at a time; arrives at the top of the tower with a broad grin on his face, seeing Percy huffing up them after him, and the cup is somewhere downstairs; Oliver would be hard pressed to mention a time that he felt happier. There’s nothing that he can’t say or do; nowhere he would prefer to be.

“I have to go down and force everyone to go to bed. Will you be OK here on your own?”

“I’m not on my own. There’s at least- there’s always- it’s Chris! Chris is here.”

“If you’re sure,” Percy says, and Oliver huffs. They’re looking at each other again- and it feels as though Percy is going to pat him on the head or-

“I’m going to throw up soon.” Oliver says. “Better get to the toilet before that happens.”

“Jesus,” Percy goes pale. “Probably best.”

-

Percy doesn’t want to think of himself as solely the “head boy.” He is more than that, surely; maybe not to the more impressionable, younger students, but surely to his peers and teachers he is also just a boy in their class. Who happens to be able to give out house points and refer pupils to teachers for detention. Which is of course a very worthwhile and important duty of the head boy (he has a reputation for detentions, but when you look at the numbers, the head girl, actually, gives them out more than he does.) There are plenty of other things he has to do. He has to look at how everyone is doing academically and see if anyone is doing worse than expected and bring this up with their head of house. He has to make sure that all the charms around the buildings are working and if they’re not, he has to either fix them or refer them to the groundskeeper or caretaker, depending on where they are situated. He has to make sure that every prefect knows what they’re doing and what the rules are, and they have started to have a Prefect’s Council this year, where they all set out what they should do and when. This year, he is first point of contact for students affected by dementors; apparently, Professor Lupin pulled him aside for some training on how to do this- Percy is full of praise for Professor Lupin, who these days has started to look more athletic, less gaunt- and his clothes suit him better, (although that’s beside the point). And on top of all that, he has taken it upon himself to set up a study club, so that people can study while supervised by members of the Library staff and actually, quote, “get some work done and stop procrastinating, because the common rooms really are terrible places to do homework.”  
Oliver is informed about all of this while very, very hungover at breakfast the next morning.

“Great,” He manages to say, as the wave of nausea rolls over him again. “That’s wonderful.”

“Here, there’s a full cooked breakfast on the way,” Katie says, as she sits down opposite them. “Oh my God, my stomach.”

“Please let’s not talk about it.”

“I think I’m going to die. I’m going to die.”

“We’re all going to die eventually,” Alicia says, coming up behind them. “Shove over, Oliver, let me sit down.” She pushes in beside Oliver, leaving him very pressed up against Percy. It’s very warm, all of a sudden. Percy’s legs and arms are soft. Does he specially condition his clothes? The fleecy blue jumper and dark jeans smell amazing, as if the colour lilac had a scent.

“Oh, look, it’s that tit, whatshername- the Prophet one,” Alicia says, scanning the Sunday edition of The Prophet and sighing. “God, I wish we had another newspaper. Look what she’s saying- homosexuality should be punishable by Azkaban. Fucking Azkaban! Dementors- for nothing!”

“I can’t believe it’s still illegal,” Katie agrees. “My cousin had to move to France. Lucky he did French here, I suppose. You know the muggles legalised it in the sixties?”

“The fucking sixties?” Oliver says, his voice a little bit too volatile. “The sixties.”

“Yes, Oliver,” Percy sighs. “Can I see that article, Alicia, please?”

“No problem.” She says, handing him the paper. “You can keep it, if you like.”

“No thanks, that’s alright” he says. “I have enough rubbish in my life dealing with the third years.”

The breakfast arrives and Oliver tears into it, nausea or no nausea.

“Saw you with Niamh Flynn yesterday,” Katie says. “Is that a thing?”

“No,” Oliver says, blushing under the combined weight of Percy and Alicia’s gaze. “I heard Freddie King was going to ask her out to Hogsmeade next week.”

“Your last Hogsmeade!” Alicia sighs. “I’m so glad. By the way, Percy, is that study thing on today? I really have wasted far too much time on Quidditch this term.”

“How very dare you.” Oliver says.

“In the library. You should all go; it really is very helpful. I have a meeting with McGonagall, though. Two second years were caught with alcohol yesterday- thanks a lot for giving it to them, by the way, Katie, you’ve really made life very difficult for me for the next two weeks.”

“Like Hell I’m going to a study session on a Sunday.” Katie says. Percy’s face falls.

“I’ll go,” Oliver says, regretting his words as he is saying them. Percy smiles widely, grinning. When he does that, he looks like Charlie, Oliver thinks, if Charlie was ever uncool enough to smile.

In the library, staring at a textbook he has opened twice before (because he does not need NEWTS, he already has a place on Cannons Minor at least, waiting to hear back from Puddlemere Reserves), it strikes Oliver- it being a realisation that makes a quaffle to the face would call subtle- that he might- might- fancy Percy Weasley.

“Cunting Fuck,” He groans into A Guide to Spell Diagrams Volume 1, Second Edition. With feeling.

In their dorm that afternoon- Chris is in detention for breaking curfew- good luck to him- Oliver is systematically buttering bread, smearing it with jam, eating it, and repeating the process. He is starving- by rights he should have rested today, but he needs to keep his fitness up, and so he went for an easy run around the Quidditch pitch that turned into a long-distance slog and now he’s starving. He hadn’t wanted to let himself think, but he couldn’t help it, so he upped the pace and the distance but it didn’t work. How has he not put these pieces together in his head before? For fuck’s sake, he’s been watching Percy pick up his socks and make his bed for seven years now. Why now, to get an attack of the- whatever the pejorative term of the month is, why not when they were fifteen?

Percy used to lie awake at night as well. Oliver could hear the difference of his breathing through the curtains of their beds, wondered what he was thinking about. He had figured schoolwork then, although now he’s not so sure. He can’t tell if that’s happening anymore because fucking Chris snores like how Oliver imagines dragons sleep. He’s nearly at the end of the bread. Shit.

Percy wanders into the room, head hanging. He looks asleep on his feet.

“Oh!” He says, when he sees Oliver. Unaccountably, he blushes and looks away. “Sorry, I didn’t think you’d be in here.”

“I’m just eating bread, mate.” Oliver says. He feels sad, for some reason, and like he wants to pin Percy to the wall and do something unspeakable (and, he supposes, illegal). He’s staring. Oh, well. Being subtle has never been his strong point and at this stage he is prepared to accept that it never will be.

“No, of course. Wait, where did you get that? The kitchens aren’t allowed give out food whenever the students want, it’d be an appalling mess.”

“Are you going to report me?” Oliver says, buttering the last slice, and deciding to forgo the jam. “Five points from Gryffindor?” There is a long pause, and an air of consideration.

“No.” Percy sighs, at length. “But please don’t make a habit of it.”

“I need to eat, Percy.” Oliver says. “You really don’t want to see me when I’ve not had enough to fucking eat, I’m such a cunt.”

“I doubt that”, Percy says, looking through his satchel with a distracted air that makes Oliver want to scream. “Oh, here it is.”

It's Alicia’s newspaper, folded crisply on the page of the article they were reading earlier. Percy smooths it out despite the lack of obvious creases, and begins to read, growing paler the longer he reads. Percy’s complexion is not healthy to begin with; he looks pallid.

“The gay article, is it?” Oliver says, wanting to make conversation to distract from the woman who is actively advocating for imprisoning him, but not able to come up with any conversational topics to actually achieve this.

“It’s just nonsense.” Percy says, a thin and fake smile sitting weirdly on his face, not in any way masking the emotion in his eyebrows. “Some people.”

Oliver feels something bubbling up inside and, to his horror, he hears his own voice say “it’s not nonsense. Gay people are put in fucking danger by comments like those. We should be more fucking careful when cunts like that are in the paper.”

A short silence. Oliver reflects that it is probably the way he said it more than what he actually said. But his life is a disaster anyway. So why bother. Fuck it all to Shite. Percy’s face is proper flaming pink.

“So you- know,” He says, voice strangled. “You know. Well. I suppose it was stupid of me to pretend that I could hide it, what with us living- Christ. Christ. Christ!”  
Oliver feels like Percy has skipped a stage in the logical progression of this conversation.

“What do I know? To be clear about this?” He asks, wary, because Percy’s tugging at his hair and squeezing his eyes shut and he doesn’t want to make that worse.

“I’m- oh my God.” Percy shakes his head. Sitting on the edge of his bed, looking at his knees- looking like a painting or something, a painting in a museum, the light from the window streaming onto his bed in a manner that an impressionist would consider a little bit much. Oliver is in his tracksuit and a t-shirt which is as clean as it needs to be for an afternoon eating bread. Percy’s shoulders look like they’d give you a papercut. “I can’t even say it out loud.”

“Well,” Oliver says, frustration growing, “I can’t fucking help you if you don’t communicate.”

“There’s no need to swear, Oliver,” Percy snaps. “I’m trying my very best here, alright?”

“Your best to do what? Beans on fucking toast, Percy, what do you want me to do here? Sit and wait for you to-”

“I’m gay,” Percy hisses. “Happy now?” And he stands up, visibly fuming at Oliver and, probably, horrified at having aired this secret.

Oh.

“Yes, actually,” Oliver feels a broad smile spread over his face. “I’m totally delighted.” He’s not even a tiny bit sorry; this is the second-best thing that’s happened to him this weekend.

“You should be- sorry, you’re happy?”

“I think you are the fittest lad in the fucking school.” Oliver says, cheeks holding up a smile that will probably become manic in a few minutes. “I really like you.”

Percy closes his eyes for a second and pinches the bridge of his nose. He mutters something under his breath and then looks at Oliver again.  
Fuck, it is not fair that he gets to be able to do this to a man. Oliver is trying his goddamn best, but those eyes- it’s like there’s some sort of lamp inside them or something; he really, really wants to start the kissing bit now.

“I want to clarify,” Percy says slowly and carefully, “that you’re not pulling my leg.”

“Percy, if I were pulling your leg, I would not give you a secret about myself that could ruin my life.” Oliver explains. “That would be very fucking counter-productive.”

“You never used to swear this much,” Percy says, thoughtfully.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Percy, please would you just fucking say something.”

“Well, then. Well. Jesus. Well. I’m never going to be Minister for Magic now- although let’s be honest, my chances were shot as soon as Hermione Granger showed up.”

“Percy.”

“I’m sorry.” Percy sits back down on his bed and pushes his shoes off. They land perfectly side by side. “I just- I really thought you knew. I thought I was being so bloody obvious.”

“You probably were,” Oliver shrugs. “You should have used some quidditch metaphors. Are you saying you like me back?”

“You’ve sent the quaffle through the hoop,” Percy says, drily, as if talking to someone not in the room. “Or, I suppose, stopped the quaffle going through the hoop, in your case.”

“Thank the lord fuck”, Oliver says, and meets Percy’s eyes, and they sit there, opposite each other, smiling, as the prophet lies forgotten at the end of the bed.

-

They kiss a lot. Even by Oliver’s lofty standards, they are kissing a lot. Percy (obviously despite living an illegal life and risking- well, basically, risking everything he’s ever worked for) is a model student and studies all the time and so they’re not kissing as much as they could, but basically it is pretty much solid kissing when they don’t have study or self-imposed exercise. Percy refuses to do it in the dorms- just in case Chris comes in (a nightmare)- and so they kiss in the places under the normal classrooms that smell really strongly of vodka, and they kiss where all the sad ghosts who don’t have any friends hang out- they won’t gossip, they like the company- and they kiss in the weird side corridors that don’t go anywhere near Trelawney’s classroom, and they kiss beside the clock in the tower, and they kiss- once they went too far down into the basement and Oliver felt a cold dread and his Grandda and Granny-

“We’re too close to those- awful dementors.” Percy said, and they’d hightailed it out of there and sat on their beds, miserable, all evening., sometimes looking at each other, but not saying much of anything.

But anyway, they kiss anywhere they think they’re not going to be found- one glorious day, Chris has to go home and see his auntie who’s over from Canada, and they just- well, actually, Percy is asleep pretty much as soon as he closes his eyes these days, so there’s nothing majorly- well, Oliver had been envisioning something a little different. But that’s OK. It’s really lovely, actually, just being able to- he feels like such an awful romantic sap, this kind of thing has never been who he is- he has never been one for flowers- he actually is not a big fan of flowers, there’s a fact- and- but- It’s just that Niamh Flynn was snogging Freddie King for hours yesterday outside where all the first years could see (if they’d uncovered their eyes to look) and yet when Oliver holds hands with Percy they’re both facing the closed door and listening closely, in case Chris has forgotten something. It does feel nice, though, Oliver thinks. Sometimes he thinks the sun is rising and slowly over him, warming him from the toes upwards, and then he remembers that no, it’s not the sun (not in April, not with this weather, glad the Season’s over) but actually Percy, and he’s delighted with himself and with Percy- who is probably doing something innocuous like giving some second years a detention for messing on the stairs or lecturing somebody on how important the head boy legacy is, unaware that Oliver can’t stop smiling for no reason. It’s hard when you have to make sure that you’re not together all the time, because you weren’t before; when all Oliver wants in the world is just to be able to kiss Percy until their lips are numb. He would also like to listen to him talk; shame it’s not about quidditch (he knows nothing about quidditch, which scares Oliver; the fact that he does not care about the sport won’t process in his brain, which they’re going to have to get over, but some other time). He wants to do everything together all the time and- ugh, he’s terrible. He’s terrible. But also, it’s lovely and amazing. He can’t stop smiling; homework is a total non-starter, he can’t concentrate on anything at all (everything is very Percy-centric in his head at the minute, Percy and Quidditch) but it’s not like he was that great to begin with, so the only professors who really care at this stage are Lupin and McGonagall; as such, probably the only two subjects he’ll pass will be DADA and Transfiguration.

“Honestly, Wood,” McGonagall says, as she hands him back a test- he’s passed the test, which means she hasn’t a leg to stand on- “You were getting much higher marks at the beginning of the term.”

Oliver wants to retort that he hadn’t got a job lined up at the start of the term, but he figures that would be insensitive to the people around him who are getting more stressed as time goes by. He himself wakes up every morning feeling amazing. The world is an amazing place.

“Anna got her acceptance letter,” He says to Percy, who smiles brightly, like Oliver has found the world’s best organisational chart.

“That’s great!” He says, although it’s no surprise; Anna turned all the daisies on the school playing field blue last week for no reason. He has really shiny eyes, Oliver thinks. He’s really gorgeous.

And then, after the last class of the day, they- literally, they’re just sitting side by side on a table having a discussion in an empty classroom- Oliver’s bloody eating, for God’s sake, it’s the most mundane thing ever- and he’s just looking at Percy, smiling and eating a ham sandwich, and Percy is looking back, and smiling, while explaining something that has been going over Oliver’s head for the past five minutes.

“And now I really do have to go study, Ol, really you have no idea, I have no clue about any of this DADA stuff we did today, only the basics. I’m definitely going to fail this next test on Tuesday; it’ll be a disaster.”

“You study way too much,” Oliver says. “Seriously, you’d pass the test now, if you took it.”

“Stop,” Percy says, as if Oliver is flattering him, or something. “You’re too much.”

“For God’s sake.” Oliver mutters. He leans his head on Percy’s shoulder. “Don’t go yet. Five more minutes.”

“Alright.” Percy says, mouth pulled up weirdly at the corners as if he’s not smiling on purpose. He sighs contentedly. “Your head’s not half heavy.”

“My head is a normal size for a head.” Oliver says back, lazily. “Maybe yours is just light because you’re stupid or something. Maybe you’re the weird one. Ever think about that?”

“Oh my God,” Percy says, drily. “What will I do.”

And Oliver swings his legs up onto the desk and leans further in; Percy rearranges himself so his arm is around Oliver’s shoulders. They sit in a contented silence for about thirty seconds (a long time)- and then the door opens and Professor Lupin walks in.

They stare at each other for what feels like hours.

“Oh my God.” Percy says softly, and Oliver feels like he should apologise but he stops himself- he has nothing of which to be ashamed. Lupin, for his part, doesn’t seem like he’s going to hand them over to the dementors immediately- there might still be some time to come up with a scenario that makes this position seem reasonable. Percy was shot in the side and I am using my shoulder to staunch the flow of blood, for example.

“Alright, boys,” Lupin says, looking exhausted. “My office. Come on, chop chop- Percy, could you get the roll book from the teacher’s desk- thanks.”

They walk in uneasy silence up the stairs to Lupin’s office, which involves walking past the library. Oliver feels a pang of guilt- this is my fault, he thinks, and he’s getting more and more miserable with every step he takes. Beside him, Percy is as pale as he ever has been- well, not as pale as that whole mess with his sister last year, but still- pretty pale. They walk into the office- Oliver has never been inside before. And this is such bullshit, because Lupin was probably the best professor, asides from McGonagall, he’s ever had. And now he’s going to ruin their lives, or something.

“Sit down. Do you want some tea?”

“No, thanks, Professor.” Percy says in a small voice, sitting down on one of the two chairs in front of the desk. Oliver takes the other and looks over- Percy looks like he’s on the edge of tears.

“Oliver?”

Oliver shakes his head. What is this? Why on Earth would you offer someone tea before- whatever is going to happen?

Oh my God, he’s going to tell my fucking parents.

“Right. Well, lads.” Oliver braces himself. “You’re going to have to be more careful.”

“What?” Oliver says.

“You can’t just sit like that in where people can see. Neither of you are stupid. You both know it’s not allowed.”

“It’s illegal.” Percy says. “Not “not allowed.” That makes it sound like it’s just some school rule that we happened to break.”

“Yes. Of course.” Lupin says. He pauses, his expression difficult to read. “I’m sorry.”

Oliver has never heard a teacher apologise in his life.

“What’s going to happen? Are you going to go off and tell our parents?” Oliver asks.

“Good lord, Wood. Of course not.” Lupin says, seeming shaken- “Oh. Sorry, again. I just realised how this all seems. No, God, no, neither of you are in any trouble- God knows that would be- hypocritical, at best. No, I’m offering you some advice- I’m sure you’re aware of the political situation at the minute.”  
Percy nods as Oliver shakes his head. Lupin sighs.

“Well, Percy can fill you in, Oliver. I’m telling you it’s going to get worse before it gets better. I wish I could tell you that you’re better off not hiding, but I can’t. Not at the minute. It’s not safe.”

“I knew that much.” Oliver mumbles. Percy gives him a nudge- a shut-up kind, not a well-done kind.

“It’s not as easy said as done,” Lupin fixes them with a stare that looks- almost jealous. “It’s not easy. It’s not fair. Life’s not fair.”

For some reason Oliver wants to console him.

“We understand, sir,” He says softly, about as tactful as he’s ever been in his life. “We’ll be more careful. We promise.”

“Good. Now, I believe you have NEWTS in less than a month?”

They agree, and flee the office. Oliver wants to talk about it, but how can he? Where would they? Who else is there? He’s beginning to understand what Lupin meant.

“Perce,” he says, miserable.

“I know.” Percy says. They stand in silence, Percy twisting the buttons on his cuffs, and then they go their separate directions.

 

They don’t end up talking about it; there’s a fair amount of eye avoiding when they pass Lupin on the stairs, and they remain sitting beside each other at dinner, but besides all that; nothing. They find more secluded places by mutual unspoken agreement, and if Percy holds Oliver’s hand a little tighter, they don’t mention it.  
The first day of May, a Saturday, is sunny and bright. Oliver can’t wait to get out running; he’s itching to move. Who knows, he’s feeling productive- he might even study. The post begins to filter in, which never usually bothers him because his parents write to him on Sundays, but a letter drops in front of him anyway.

“Shit!” He hisses, and knocks over a glass of milk. Percy sighs, put upon, and cleans it up. Oliver sees the postmark and feels dizzy.

“Fuck.” He says.

“What? What is it?” Alicia asks.

Oliver hands the envelope to her, and she whistles.

“I can’t do it.” He says. “You’re going to have to open it for me.”

“Who’s it from?” Percy and Katie say at the same time. Angelina looks down from where’s she’s sitting, a ways away.

“Is it Puddlemere?” She asks.

“Yes.” Oliver says. “I wasn’t kidding, Alicia, look at my hands, I can’t even hold the fork.”

“Fine.” Alicia says, beginning to break the seal. Oliver squeezes his eyes shut and blocks his ears, and waits.

Percy begins tapping him on the shoulder, but he waits a few more moments, just in case they’re fucking with him.

“OLIVER,” Katie says. He reluctantly looks up at Alicia, who is smiling broadly at him, the letter unopened in her hands.

“What- what is it? Is it good news?”

“Depends on if you’re happy to play for Puddlemere Reserves or not, I guess, Oliver.” Alicia says. “I personally would think it was bad news. But you have some sort of unhealthy obsession with Scotland, so I guess…”

Oliver leans over and grabs the letter, and, true enough, we would be delighted to offer you a place on our Reserve team. More information to follow. Congratulations… etc.

“Sit down,” Percy hisses. “Everyone’s staring.”

“Cunt,” Oliver says, joyfully, trying his best not to cry. “Fucking Shit.”

“Oliver, there are children who could hear you!” Percy says again. “Sit. Down.”

“Ah, let him cry.” Alicia says. “He’s a repressed soul; you may never see this level of emotion from him ever again. Look, he’s achieved all his dreams; he gets to fly around in the rain until he retires at thirty-five with more money than anyone could ever spend.”

“Quidditch for my whole life,” Oliver says.

“Which is good, because you’re no good at anything else.” Katie says, reading the acceptance letter.

“He can duel.” Angelina throws in. “He can duel pretty well, actually.”

“How in the name of God do you know that?” Katie asks.

“We tried to duel him for the weekend off, once.” Fred says. “He fought off both of us at the same time and then did this weird thing where he made us practise for three extra hours on Sunday morning. It was a lot of fun.”

“I am literally the luckiest person on the planet.” Oliver says, and for once, nobody disagrees with him. He sits down, and enjoys his breakfast.

Later, he’s coming in from his training run- it still feels unseasonable cold, for May- and McGonagall stops him on the stairs. He feels it move, and his stomach swoops uncomfortably.

“I hear you were swearing in the Great Hall today.” She says, face, as ever, beautifully impassive.

“Sorry, Professor,” Oliver says, feeling like a child.

“Don’t do it again.” She says, and then smiles. “We’ll have a Scots captain of Puddlemere yet, it seems.”

Oliver grins so broadly that her composure cracks, and she smiles back.

Later, he will remember maybe a fifth of the NEWTS; they’re not on his radar even a little. He will mostly remember Percy and the way he would study late into the night; how eventually Chris couldn’t take it anymore and just slept in the common room, and so Oliver would flick balls at paper at Percy until Percy snapped and looked up from his books; who could hold his attention the longest; Oliver was not jealous of the books, because that would be ridiculous, but he resented them a little.  
“You’re going to get straight O’s no matter what you do. And even if you didn’t you’d still get your ministry job.” He would say, and Percy would huff loudly, and claim to hate him, but he didn’t, not at all; Oliver knew that more than he knew most things.

The Last Day- the Very Last Day- after this year’s horror show of an end-of-year surprise (which had Percy kicking trees in random bursts of frustration for days)- dawns bright and, now that the dementors are gone, warm. All the girls in their year are crying, and Percy is looking a little bit misty eyed. Oliver is not. He’s done everything he wanted to do here now; sometimes there’s no option but to move on with things. Still, the towers and the Quidditch pitch; he will miss watching the flags and the hoops through small and dirty windows, and the ease of knowing what he’s supposed to be doing at any given time; how people here know him and like him; he’s going to miss the constant free food.  
He loves the way these mornings are; the pale blue of the sky and the diamond-sharp edge to the air in his lungs, the pastel of the grass and the heavy scent of gorse and green. The way the sun slants easy towards the ground, the clear light pooling. There’s a future to these mornings. He’s young, yet. Percy, beside him on the platform, turns to look back at the building, shading his eyes against the sun. The train pulls in, chuffing, filling the shelter with smoke.

“Hurry the fuck up, mate,” Oliver says, and Percy turns to him and smiles.


	2. Work

Oliver has a whole month free, which is good. Percy has work every day, it seems, which is less so; but he’s worked out a very complicated way of letting his family think he’s working when he’s actually seeing Oliver (not that he doesn’t also stay in the office a lot.) It’s everything he’s ever wanted and quite possibly it’s more; Oliver doesn’t doubt that he is as genuinely amazed as he seems when, during his first month on the job, he is moved up from research assistant to just a plain researcher (while also being an assistant)- not that he is paid even half so well as the other researchers but that’s not a massive problem because he wouldn’t have spent most of the money anyway. Oliver’s not sure; he’s worked out that about half of his salary goes to his parents and he saves most of the rest; he has enough for coffees in Steel Alley but not dinners. And Oliver believes, too, that cauldron-bottoms are important. He does not need the lecture every time he makes a joke about the amount of time one can spend thinking on the issue. But it is true that there have been 300 injuries this year alone- and so on, and so forth. If Percy can save 300 people from clogging up St. Mungo’s, that’s good, he supposes. It’s not quidditch, though. Only Quidditch is Quidditch. And Percy knows more about Quidditch than he does- this will only be true for this one month this year and probably will never be true again and Percy just loves having it to lord over him. It’s driving Oliver crazy, which Percy seems to know, because he keeps dropping hints that are in no way helpful. It’s illegal for him to tell Oliver anything concrete, so he obviously wouldn’t even countenance it, but this is just unfair.  
“ _Tell_ me,” Oliver says, propping himself up over Percy, boxing him in. Percy, flushed, shirtless and grinning, shakes his head.  
“Shan’t,” He says. “Are you going to continue, or...?”  
“Not unless you tell me something.”  
“Well, sorry, Ol, it’s been nice while it lasted and though I must say I was looking forward to spending more time in this flat, seeing as-”  
Oliver cuts him off with a kiss. “You are such a shit,” He says, when they break apart, and Percy grins again.  
“You really will lose it when you see this one particular detail, though,” He says, and Oliver hits him with a pillow.

Of course, the Quidditch World Cup is indeed everything Oliver hoped it would be. His Da, sitting beside him, is appalled that he would take notes- _take notes! -_ on a day like this, but his Da is clueless about the Messianic capabilities of Alan Kelly the most wonderful keeper in the history of the sport- who was at the _top of his game, this is a privilege to be able to see-_ so of course he is taking notes. The joys of it all.  
And the way Ireland win is the best way any team has ever won anything in the history of the universe. Seriously amazing. Incredible.  
“Are you crying?” His Ma asks, handing him a tissue as he finally sits back down into his seat.  
“This is just very fu- very meaningful to me.” He says, drying his eyes.  
“Were you about to swear?” She asks, this time with an edge to her voice.  
“Of course not, mum.” He says. “Where would I have even learned such language?”

“And he doesn’t even know my name, and now they’re all laughing at me.”  
“You and your pride.” Oliver says, gently. “Shut up and kiss me, we really don’t have long before somebody comes to drink cider.”  
“If you insist,” Percy says, so put upon that Oliver has to laugh.

Of course, then it’s totally ruined. Oliver finds later that he’s able to separate the two events in his head pretty clearly- there’s the match and the Percy, and then there’s the terrorism and the aftermath of that. There’s suddenly no doubt in his mind that if he ever gets the chance, he’s going to fight against this with everything he can give. He’s not proud of this, exactly; shouldn’t it be for- life and freedom and love and things? But no, it’s that they would dare impugn _Quidditch_ in this way that opens his eyes to the fact that these guys- he _won’t_ call them Death Eaters, that is a really fucking stupid name- are fucking ruthless.

“I know,” Percy says, looking gaunt, about three weeks later when he’s finally finished with the clean-up and damage control. “It’s awful. How are you holding up?”  
“I’m alright. It was scary. I don’t know, it always seems like you’re going to be the protagonist, doesn’t it- when you hear about those battles in the First War. You always think you’re going to be one of the all-stars.”  
“Don’t call it the First War,” Percy says, mouth tight. “There’s no proof that this isn’t some one-off random group of extremists.”  
“Sorry. Reading too much Prophet, I suppose.”  
“No, no. It’s all been a bit hectic, trying to make sure the markets don’t fall too much. You have to stay optimistic.”  
“Yeah, no. I get it.” Oliver says, nodding.  
“How’s training going, anyway?”  
And now Oliver has long, drawn out, and no doubt boring stories to regale Percy with; he can tell when he’s crossed the line from boring to _incredibly_ boring, and he doesn’t have to care, because Percy has to listen to him.

Percy arrives late to their coffee one day, but he’s smiling, which is rare enough these days that Oliver lets it slide.  
“Did you know about the tri-wizard coming back this year?” He asks, and Percy tries to look nonchalant.  
“Of course,” he says, in his smug way. “Didn’t you?”  
“No, it being just announced, and all,” Oliver says, but he doesn’t mind really; he’s just come from a gruelling training with the prospect of fitness after lunch; he’s feeling good. “Are you involved?”  
“I have to sort everything.” Percy nods. “They’re relying on me a lot; not that I mind, of course, but it just seems rather inefficient. And honestly, Oliver, he still doesn’t know my name.”  
“That’s pretty bad, alright.”  
“But how are you?” Percy asks. “How’s Quidditch?” He seems mildly unsure, as if he’s not certain he should have asked that question.  
“Good!” Oliver begins, and launches into some story or other. Percy leans back, his milky coffee held in his hands, something fond and soft in his face, him beginning to grow into his glasses and nose, and Oliver wishes he could put his hand on his, wishes for the warmth, internal and external, that the touch would bring. But nothing; he can’t do that here.  
  Percy seems to catch him looking, stops leaning back on his chair and instead tilts his head slightly to the left- are you alright? Oliver doesn’t stop for breath, but gives a slight incline of the head. Fine.  
They have some time to kill before Percy has to be back- 20 minutes before he actually has to be back- and so they walk along some of the alleys, Oliver sometimes feeling the scratchy cheap wool of Percy’s ministry robes brush his hand. The streets are packed at this time of day. He gets pushed into Percy as often as he possibly can.  
“I have to go to a bakery and pick up something for Liz,” Oliver says, as they meander slowly back to the Ministry building entrance. “Do you want to come in for a second?”  
When they get to the bakery she specified, there’s no room. Percy waits outside, conscientiously not leaning against the wall. Oliver catches glimpses of him checking his watch in one of the mirrored wall panels. The September sun is still warm.  
Oliver squeezes his way past the other customers with an enormous cake box and an éclair.  
“Here.” He says, handing it to Percy, and Percy seems flabbergasted for a second.  
“They’re my favourites.” He says, eventually, touched.  
“I know.” Oliver says. He grins. “You should eat more, you’ve lost weight.”  
“Oh, really? As if I don’t hear that every day at home.”  
“Why don’t you get your own place?” Oliver asks, even though he knows why. Still, doesn’t hurt to ask. Percy has cream on his nose.  
“Maybe,” He replies, which is a definite no. “They like having me there.”  
“But you do so much for them,” Oliver says, adding internally, _and they don’t seem to always like you._ Which is a new perspective on the whole family; Oliver’s finding it hard to reconcile with his equally accurate idea of them coming from years of Quidditch.  
“Not really,” Percy shrugs. “I don’t do much for them at all, really. I never have to do any chores. It’s OK. Now, I really do have to go, there’s a meeting I must sit in on or else I’ll be lost tomorrow…” He trails off, and Oliver wants badly to kiss him, looking as he does so soft and smiling. He’s seen other couples do it; without even thinking, a kiss on the cheek goodbye. He supposes Percy must be thinking the same thing; the look in his eyes saddens a little, and when he says “goodbye” there’s an edge to it.  
“You’ve got cream on your nose,” Oliver tells him, and apparates with the cake in his hand.

Next week, they’re sitting on a windy beach, sand every so often blowing in their eyes. They’re sharing a bag of chips, the grease and salt warm on their hands. Oliver is staring out at the sea, watching the gannets dive in to catch fish; he’s aware of Percy’s attention being directed at a muggle girl and her dog near the shore. It’s still warm enough, when they’re sheltered from the breeze, but she’s not dressed to go swimming. Probably just as well. The currents here are notorious. They could drag a person out and under before they realise what’s happening.  
Percy rests his hand under a layer of the thick grey paper, the top of his index brushing off a chip that hasn’t been eaten yet. They spent all day in Oliver’s apartment; or, at least, all afternoon, lazy, and touching. Oliver unfurls like a morning glory in the sun when Percy’s hand is in his, feels like a cat, stretching his back under a warmth that, all too soon, will be stretched away. The sun will set in a little while and they’ll have to decide- stay or go; for now, Oliver looks at Percy’s wind beaten pink cheeks and takes his hand under the paper, clasping it tightly. Percy had been shirtless, lying on the bed, reading some report, and making notes but Oliver could tell his heart wasn’t in it; his bare toes, curling into the fabric of the duvet, his glasses halfway down his nose, and for once an uncomplicated smile, a smile that was doing nothing else and thinking of nothing else; only smiling. Oliver wore his tracksuit pants and lay on his front and rested his head on his hands, gazing up, feeling his eyes widen, feeling, sometimes, the strength of the simple warmth of Percy’s gaze, and they had not said a word to each other for the whole afternoon, are not really speaking now.

There of course had been books and stories when Oliver was young about princesses and young witches and how they always managed to bag a man, and later his mother listened to the wireless, soaps from Spain, all talking and being passionate at each other, ¡Ay Dolores, yo moriría por tí! And he had accepted that as a dramatic convention but had always assumed they hammed it up, or it was a euphemism; now he is altogether full up of Percy. It has not been long but it- well, it doesn’t matter, surely it doesn’t matter what he learned as a young child; as he has grown he has realised that most of it was wrong or incomplete, or it has left him with a hole in his chest and a small voice in his head that he doubts can ever be truly filled or silenced; whatever he had learned about love is inconsequential, out of sequence, unimportant; he knows now, that, somehow, there is a bigger part, most of him, that can’t really get by without this any longer; that now he has known what it is to wear a tracksuit and stare at someone for five hours, or the electricity that comes with it all- a sunburst over his toes in the sand and his knee next to Percy’s, a reverse Jericho, a foundation built on stone- both the most and the least dramatic event of his life, seismic and completely expected; Percy is holding Oliver’s hand; he always was and he always will be holding on to Oliver’s hand. The sea is blue and grey, and so is the sky.

“I really like you.” Percy says, softly. He doesn’t want to make a big deal out of this; he doesn’t love out loud; except for when he needs to, apparently.  
“Me too,” Oliver nods, and very briefly considers kissing him- after all, this is a muggle beach, and muggle men _can-_ but they don’t- God help them, at the moment, God _help_ them- and decides against it, but he does squeeze is hand, turn, smile; hopefully uncomplicatedly. There remains much to say, Oliver can’t bring himself to maybe spoil something by waxing stupid-poetic. Let it stay like this; five more minutes.

His mother is chopping vegetables when he apparates into the kitchen. She swears loudly.  
“What a surprise! Brian, look who it is! What’s the reason for this? Are you alright? Let me look at you.”  
“Oh,” Oliver says, loose and cheerful, “I just missed you, and I’m free for the evening.”  
“How are you getting on, Ollie?” Brian says, coming in with a folded Prophet in his hand, “How’s training?”  
“Amazing.” Oliver says, and is about to launch into the joys of six am starts when he sees his parents’ faces close off, and he doesn’t go into the details.  
“Well, I wish you had told us you were coming, darling,” Oliver’s ma says. “I would have made more.”  
“Oh, no, that’s OK, I’ve already eaten.”  
“The boy can make himself some toast, Margaret” Brian says. “Come on now.”  
“He needs protein.”  
“There’s ham in the fridge,” Oliver shrugs, “I’ll make a sandwich.”  
“Sandwiches for dinner,” Oliver’s Ma says, scornfully. She turns around to face him, and Brian puts his arm around her shoulder. “Your sister is getting on well, by the way.”  
“I know, I write to her sometimes. Ravenclaw.”  
“Didn’t see that one coming,” Brian says, rolling his eyes. “She’s enjoying her subjects, although the man they have in teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts is really- by the sound of it, he’s quite something. I know Mr. Lupin turned out to be a werewolf- but he was at least a good teacher.”  
“Hmm.” Oliver’s Ma says. “I wish they had _told_ us there was a Dark Creature on the staff. Not that they aren’t trustworthy, but there’s a line, surely. Werewolves are dangerous. I saw a little girl into the bite ward last month… nearly savaged the poor thing. At least they got to her in time.”  
“Professor Lupin was really good,” Oliver says. “I got an O, for God’s sake. He was good with my seeker as well, helped him out a lot.” It was Oliver’s Ma who started calling Harry Potter “Oliver’s Seeker”, and it had stuck. She was a firm admirer.   
“Oh, I’m sure the man is lovely, I wish him only the best, I really do. We know him from when we were young- kind of. I’m just wondering if a school is the best place for him.”  
Brian, leaning in to the counter, regards them carefully. He hasn’t said much, as is his wont; he rarely contributes to these discussions at all. His hair is slightly grey; he has a scar along his jaw from the war, which he doesn’t talk about.  
“Anyway,” Oliver says, “How are things with you guys? How’re the floo accounts, Da?”  
“Oh Lord, the slightest uncertainty and the markets go loopy. It’s a struggle keeping them under the tariffs. A nightmare.”  
Oliver is reminded of something similar Percy said last week. Something in the cadence is the same.  
He stays until he gets tired, and then he decides to head off. His mother pulls him in tight for a hug, and then piles him up with boxes of leftovers. Brian ruffles his hair.   
“Any girls on the horizon?” He asks, raising an eyebrow.  
“None you’re going to meet!” Oliver grins, which is not exactly a lie, and then he disappears.

There is nothing he loves less than being in the advertising, and they’ve been taking pictures all day of the whole team to send to newspapers; somehow it’s far more exhausting than playing quidditch for six hours, and he’s feeling catty when he gets back. And then he reads about His Seeker and a Dragon in the Tri-wizard cup and he’s appalled, and it turns out that Nadia from healing can’t go to the pub next week with the rest, and (he knows this is bad, they’re his teammates- but they’re not in this for the quidditch, is the thing!) she was the only reason she was going. When he gets in, he dumps his bag on the floor and sits down to read, but it’s a really boring book, so he puts on the stereo, but he’s listened to this album so much that it’s lost all meaning. He should go for a run but that’s not going to be any less boring. So he reads the paper and he’s shocked all over again that they would let kids- _kids! -_ fight dragons for sport. There’s also a side note that says that Quidditch is on hold for the year, which leaves him blindingly furious, _because they’d already told Angelina she was captain._  
It is to this mood that Percy arrives, fresh from work, circles under his eyes. Oliver checks his watch. It’s half ten.  
“Hello,” Percy says, removing his cloak, and carefully handing it on the hook behind the door. He kisses the top of Oliver’s head and sits beside him.  
“Hey,” Oliver mutters, feeling a little better but not by much. “How long do you have?”  
“I told Dad I was pulling an all-nighter and that I’d be back in the early morning, so I’ve got a while.”

Something gives up in Oliver for a while, and he finds the fact that Percy- who spends all day trying to reach arbitrary standards so his Dad will be proud (a dad that is proud of Fred and George, as he seems to be, must surely also be proud of Percy, after all)- that Percy has to lie to his Dad so that he can spend time with Oliver- and if Oliver were a girl, that would be all Percy’s mother’s hopes and dreams for her son come true- fundamentally wrong. He was put in Gryffindor for a reason. He likes it when things are morally right.  

“Does that not bother you?” He asks, and Percy looks at him in askance.  
“Well, of course it does,” He says. “Obviously it does. Why do you ask?”  
“You look horrendous, you’re tired all the time, and you have to lie, and part of that is because of this. Would you not try and change something?”  
“Oh yeah.” Percy says, his face hardening a little. “Thanks. Oh, hi Percy, you look terrible and you’re no fun to be around. By the way, how are you?”  
“I’m being serious.” Oliver says. “You have some power to change this. Why don’t you?”  
“Oh _great,_ seriously _great advice,_ you know what would really help my career and also be a safe thing for me to do right now? Publicly advocate for the gays! That wouldn’t be taken in the wrong way _at all!_ ”  
“There’s no use in being fucking sarcastic, Percy, I’m just fucking asking.”  
“Why? You know there’s nothing I can do. I haven’t even been working there for a year- why don’t you do it? You know, get a march going up Diagon Alley? People would join you, you know they would- after all, there are more than you’d think-” which is a dig at something Oliver had said, earlier that month, having a less angry version of this conversation.  
“Oh, so your career is sacrosanct but mine is disposable? Because why, because I just play sports?”  
Percy narrows his eyes and, ominously, casts a silencing charm over the apartment.  
“That’s not what I meant, and you know it,” he says in a low voice. “But if that’s the road you’re going to go down, then it’s a very hypocritical one.”  
“Hypocritical? Me? Every time I can’t make something it’s like the end of the fucking world, and here I am, living off your fucking timetable, when _you_ have time to see me, when _you_ can _fit me in,_ like I’m some sort of kept fucking woman.”  
“Oliver, I kept telling you during the Summer it was going to be this way this year. I have an important job and sometimes that comes first, because things will go terribly wrong for lots and lots of fucking people if I don’t make a meeting!” Percy’s on his feet, tugging at his hair.  
“Again! You’re doing it again! You don’t think I’m fucking serious! You’re not fucking Minister yet, _darling,_ you’re an assistant to a department head!” Oliver snarls, with feeling.  
“Don’t tell me that like I don’t know. Don’t try and tell me what I have to do on a day to day basis. I get enough at this at home, I don’t need it from you too, I’m doing-” Percy pauses, a new light in his eyes, “yes, I’m sorry, I _am_ doing more work than you do, I _am_ working for longer- I worked for fourteen hours today and I’ll be working for sixteen tomorrow because I came to see _you,_ so don’t you-”  
“Ah, God help you, Percy,” Oliver cuts across him, “really, God help you, it must be _so hard_ to be you, with your big family that all love you, and your good job- it must be hard to balance all that time you spend patting yourself on the back, it really must.”  
“Who are you, one of my brothers?” Percy says, and he seems disorientated. “And like your job’s not good! Like your family are monsters! You’re just feeling guilty because unlike me you’ve got nothing to lose if you try to change laws or whatever, but you’re just too scared to do it.”  
“Scared? Me? How about you- terrified they’ll all remember you’re barely eighteen?”  
“That’s precisely the reason I can’t get involved in this!” Percy shouts. “Listen to yourself! Read the newspaper! If we let them know that we’re here, they’ll come for us sooner or later! There is something _coming._ Or are you too brain-dead stupid to see that?”  
“Excuse me? Stupid? Are you calling me stupid?”  
“No, I’m saying that concentrating solely on Quidditch isn’t going to save us!” Percy says. He covers his face with his hands, and breathes heavily. When he looks back up, his eyes are shiny and there are red lines pressed into his face from where his glasses were. “You’re not the only one who’s finding it difficult, Ol,” He says, softly. Oliver feels desperate.  
“I’m so sorry, Perce,” He says. “Oh God, I’m so fucking sorry. I’m just- I always do this, I always pick fights when I’m tired.”  
Percy sits back down, deflated. He shakes his head slightly.  
“You were right, though, I should do something. I _do_ have a plan, but it’s probably going to take years, and I’m going to need a lot of help.”  
For Percy to create a plan that involves relying on other people is almost unheard of, and Oliver is so surprised that he sits down next to him on the couch.  
“I’m so sorry.”  
“It’s alright, Ol,” Percy says. He suddenly looks his age, only four months eighteen and a bit swamped in work clothes he bought to have growing room. Oliver kisses him with a closed mouth, feeling very young himself.  
“I can’t fall asleep here,” Percy says. “I seriously can’t.”  
Oliver puts his head in his lap, enjoying the feeling of Percy’s hands through his hair and also knowing that he does not deserve to be forgiven this easily.  
“I think you should go home and have a sleep.” Oliver says. “Not that I want you to leave.”  
“Hmm. I know your game.”  
“Mmm.” Oliver says, more breath than voice, moving his head. “I’m really sorry again.”  
“It’s _all right_ Oliver.” Percy says, standing up and stretching. “You’re right, I need to go to bed.”  
Oliver gets to his feet, embracing him on instinct and getting back a much tighter squeeze than he was expecting.  
“It could be much worse,” Percy says.

Oliver is playing a match on the last day of the tournament. It’s only a friendly, anything else would have been rescheduled due to the clash. The stand is a quarter full and there’s one journalist there, probably for the Puddlemere Gazette. The normal goalkeeper begged off to go and watch the final task, though, which works out great for Oliver- he’s in the starting line-up for the first time- brilliant for his career, especially as he’s young, yet, and this will certainly make some sort of sport section; he can send it to his ma, and she won’t bemoan the fact he never went into Journalism. Anyway, they thought this was going to be an easy win; but it’s been six hours now and neither of the seekers have caught the damn snitch. Oliver’s been playing a blinder, even though it’s difficult and he’s tired, and he can tell that nobody wants to be here. The snitch whizzes past his face and he sighs, inwardly, waiting for the whoosh of two bodies hurtling past him at top speed.  
It’s dark when they finish, the other team snatching the snitch, finally, and Oliver drifts down, ready for a bath and a hot meal. Percy promised he’d take a day off, soon. They might pop down to the beach again, that was nice. Or they could just stay in. Percy would want to work anyway, Oliver’s not stupid. He’s lost in thought when he gets out of the dressing room, towelling off his hair and smiling at the compliments that some of the team- the nicer members of the team- are giving him. They trudge out of the stadium, expecting to find at least some fans, but there’s nobody there. The blue Summer night seems oppressive, somehow.  
“Chilly, isn’t it?” Monica Rodgers says, softly.  
“Something’s going on.” Omar Jones murmurs, and there are nods all round. “Do you think it has anything to do with that Ministry thing?”  
“Something could have easily gone wrong,” Oliver says. When everyone turns to look at him, he wishes he hadn’t. “It’s just- my friend works for the Ministry and he was explaining some of it to me.”  
“Those tasks are so dangerous.” Monica sighs. “That poor little Harry Potter mite is only fourteen, I was reading. The poor little thing. Oliver, you must have known him.”  
“He was my seeker.” Oliver says, proud. “He was very good, too. Once he got the hang of it, anyway. Did you know he caught his first snitch in his mouth?”  
Monica looks absolutely delighted with this news.  
“Really?” She says.  
“I can’t believe it’s been fourteen years already,” Omar says, and then, with a crack, somebody apparates right next to them, red in the face.  
“Jamal!” Omar says. “What’s wrong?”  
“Harry Potter just appeared in the middle of that tournament thing. Says You-Know-Who is back. The other Hogwarts kid-”  
“Cedric Diggory,” Oliver supplies.  
“Yeah.” The man says, and looks at Oliver, with not a little pity. “You know him?”  
“We’re mates,” Oliver says. It’s true. He’s always gotten on with Cedric, always enjoyed his company; and it was really good of him to suggest a rematch last year. It had seemed a good fit when they announced his name out of the cup.  
“Aw, I’m sorry, mate,” The man says, sympathetically. “He’s dead.”  
“Jesus!” Monica says, covering her mouth. “Oh God, his poor parents.”  
“Harry Potter’s been saying what about You-Know-Who?” Omar asks Jamal again. Jamal shakes his head.  
“I only know that much, mate, I’m sorry. Just appeared out of thin air, shouting about You-Know-Who being back and how he killed Cedric Diggory. Poor kid looked like he’d been beaten up a bit. They took him inside sharpish. Ministry’s all over the place now, and full of parents.”  
“My parents are there with my sister,” Oliver says. He feels like he’s been slapped in the face. Cedric can’t be dead. Jesus Christ, poor Cedric.  
“Are you alright, Oliver?” Monica asks, turning towards him.  
“Yeah, yeah. No, fine. Fine.” Oliver says. “I- I need to find some- I think I’m going to go to my Granny’s.”  
Omar and Jamal apparate away suddenly. It’s very dark. He turns to Monica, who’s standing alone.  
“Do you want to come?” He asks. “I know it’s a bit weird, but you could get your head together.”  
“Well aren’t you sweet.” Monica smiles. “That’s alright, hun. I’m going to pop over Frieda’s, I think. But thanks for asking, really, that does mean a lot. Are you sure you’re OK?”  
“Yeah.” Oliver says, feeling himself shake. “I think so.”

“Well?”  
“Not good. I have a note in my file.”  
“Those fuckers.”  
“No, no, they were right.  I should have noticed something, you know. He was my boss.”  
“How were you to know that he was a fucking lunatic? None of those other fuckers in the department noticed either!”  
“Dad says it was the right decision,” Percy says, very quietly. “He said that everybody messes up sometimes and we have to learn from the experiences. And I think Mum and Ron blame me.”  
“For what?”  
“For- I suppose, for letting Harry do it. For not making him put the foot down.”  
“Both of those things can’t be your fault.”  
“No, no- I knew something was weird. I kept telling you, didn’t I? Something was off. I should have said something.”  
Oliver reaches out to touch Percy’s hand- very briefly; they’re in public.  
“And then- Dumbledore was passing by, and- I have an errand to do for him.” Percy pushes his glasses up his nose and blinks a little. Oliver thinks he needs a new prescription. He’s been squinting a lot, lately, bringing things close to his face so he can read them. “It’s just I don’t think my family would be very keen on it. Especially not now.”  
“What is it? Doesn’t seem to me your family are particularly keen on anything you do in the ministry.”  
“You’ve been getting very one-sided reports,” Percy says, with a wry smile. “Dad’s disappointed for me, I know.”  
“I’d say do it, for Dumbledore.” Oliver says. “What is it, anyway?”  
“Oh, nothing major. Bringing files here and there.”  
“Jesus Christ, you are the most boring person on the planet.”  
“Just as well you seem to like boring things.”  
“Just as well,” Oliver grins, and wants with every fibre of his being to take Percy’s hand like the couple in front of them are doing. “Do you want to talk about it a bit more?”  
“I’m so embarrassed.” Percy says. “It’s just so embarrassing. You know.”  
“Not really.” Oliver says, because his job is, at the moment, very low stakes. And even if he did play very badly, they would never single him out in front of the rest of the team. Maybe on his own. Never publicly. “I can imagine, though.”

Percy seems down for the rest of the month, stressed. He stays over a couple of nights- a novelty, one Oliver wishes he could grow used to- but he doesn’t sleep, won’t eat.  
“Are you alright?”  
“Yeah, yeah. Just exhausted, really. So no change there.”

But then he comes in one day with a full duffle bag and red rimmed eyes and Oliver knows that something awful has happened.  
“Can I stay here until I can get my own place?” He asks, like he’s been rehearsing. Oliver, frying a chicken fillet and chopping a carrot, feels himself fill with an energy he’s never experienced before. He’s expecting Percy to stay for good- to move in- it makes sense, it would be nice, it is by no means unusual to share a flat with a friend from school, for God’s sake, but he’s cagey about it, and finds a flat as soon as he can. Oliver never quite gets the story from him; it’s garbled and out of chronology when he explains it on the first night and he’s so on edge for the couple weeks afterwards that they stick to very safe topics, like the weather, or the Quidditch. It emerges over time that Percy doesn’t think Voldemort is back, in a stark contrast to the rest of the family. And that Percy got a better job, assisting the Minister, and although this was a bit unusual, he was in line for a change after the Crouch debacle, but apparently, it was just to spy on the family, or something. Oliver resolutely does not bring up Harry Potter at all anymore, nor Percy’s brothers. They do not talk about the news. He feels terribly guilty for not letting the rest of them know that at least Percy’s OK and healthy and, seemingly, getting on alright at work. It makes no sense to him, this other side to events in other people’s families. His own would never be this dramatic and his Granny would never let him get away with this kind of nonsense. They get to spend a lot more time together these days, which is lovely; more lazy Sundays and more cigarettes outside muggle pubs, and the like. Oliver should not be smoking but he does anyway; Percy keeps telling him that it’s bad for him; but honestly, it’s nothing a few heavy potions can’t fix in a couple of years. They drink, too, at these pubs, Percy drinks quite a lot sometimes and ends up swaying on his feet like a flagpole with an unsteady base. They fall into bed, they sleep and wake up early, sometimes Percy is gone before Olive wakes up, and the room is marginally bigger than it seemed to be when Oliver took out the lease on his place. It feels like an echo.    
Christmas must be awful for him, Oliver reasons. He’d find it awful. Oliver himself goes back up to Scotland for the usual do, and it’s lovely. Percy doesn’t go home (he seems to have burned a few more bridges. Oliver heard through the grapevine that his Dad is seriously sick in St. Mungo’s. Percy hasn’t mentioned it. Oliver wonders if, were he not deeply in love, he would find that kind of attitude less acceptable. They’d said horrible things to one another. You don’t want to leave it like that, surely; you want to be able to say that at least he knew you didn’t hate him. Then again, maybe the accounts he’s heard were embellished). Oliver assumes he works, on the day, or goes for a walk or maybe hangs out with the old woman who lives up the stairs from him. Percy’s flat is small, dark, and smelly. It looks out over a muggle motorway and shakes when their trucks go by. Oliver wonders if that’s where Percy wanted to live or if he just chose the first place he could find. The thought hurts, and he resolves not to think it again, but it sits, deep in his mind, and on the long and lonely distance training runs he finds himself imagining asking Percy about it and having a massive row. They’ve been arguing a lot, lately, arguing and storming out and not coming back till late- and Oliver _hates_ that. Regardless of what’s going on, You-Know-Who or not, he knows that _something_ is happening and _people are dying._ And so he gets worked up and Percy comes back, remorseful- he’s always remorseful, always sorry, and Oliver obviously forgives him, until the next time when he picks a fight again and Percy slams the door on his way out. But the times in between those are the only things that Oliver really has going for him, at the minute- his Ma is mad at him for not being more academic and not thinking about what will happen after Quidditch, his Da is getting anxious again, Quidditch is not progressing as fast or as smoothly as he thought it would, Alicia Spinnet says that there’s been a right old bitch in Hogwarts for the last year, making everyone write lines in their own blood and it’s allowed because she’s from the Ministry and she just makes her own rules, there’ve been new laws that make it even harder to be gay in this country, and, to top it all off, he thinks that everyone might be wrong about this Voldemort thing, but that if he says that, they’ll all think he’s a nutter. So Percy, and his smiling and softness and gentle nagging about not smoking and cooking dinner that’s more than just carrots and chicken, his voice and his efficiency and his glasses and his knowledge, his willingness to share (on his own terms) and his willingness to break a law, his readiness to explain, the way he thinks, the way he sees the world, the way he stops to make sure small children can pass, his hands, his eyes, the freckles on the back of his shoulders, how he washes up by hand like a muggle, his awful taste in music- all that is absolutely necessary. Oliver could go on but he won’t; the clichés, while charming to his own ears, are presumably less so to people who might have to listen.  
Hypothetical people, who one day might be legally allowed listen without having to report it as some sort of a crime. And that’s the crux of this whole debate, he supposes. Because the arguments, the secrecy, the drowning sensations- lately he’s been finding it difficult to not be afraid and sometimes he can’t breathe or think straight for minutes at a time- is all coming crashing down. And he’s been sitting in a ball on his kitchen floor too often these days for everything to be alright. Something’s got to give.

The reserves are training when Monica apparates into the middle of the pitch one June afternoon, the heat haze shimmering off the stands and Oliver sweating in his gear.  
“The Ministry’s under attack! You-Know-Who is back!” She’s screaming. “It’s all true, it was all true! He’s in the foyer right now- right now! You-Know-Who is _back!_ He’s _duelling Albus Dumbledore in the Ministry of Magic!_ ”  
Oliver feels like he’s about to faint. They all land, sharpish, without the go-ahead from the coach, who watches absently as the Quaffle runs out of momentum mid-air and falls onto the grass. There is dead silence. Oliver can’t breathe for a second. Monica is as white as a sheet. All Oliver can think is Percy, Percy, Percy. The sun is burning his face. They wait for a year.  
“Go home,” The coach says. “All of you, go fucking home.”  
Oliver does not stay to find out what happens next.

He arrives home and his Da has just arrived back from the Gringotts in Glasgow; he heard what was happening because there was a run on the bank, everyone in a panic. He’d come straight back home. His Ma is glued to the wireless, finger to her lips, although she visibly relaxes when she sees them both enter the kitchen. Oliver feels sweaty and disgusting; he’s still in his practise gear.  
“Any fatalities, Ma,” He asks, panic rising in his gut.  
“Shh,” She says.  
“No, Ma, seriously, is anyone dead,” He asks again,  
“I’m trying to find out what’s going on,” She hisses.  
“Have they said is anyone dead? Come on, Ma, please, have they mentioned anyone?”  
“Oliver, what’s gotten into you?” She says. “I’m trying to hear!”  
“Ma, answer the question!”  
“Oliver!” His Da says, putting his hand on his shoulder. Oliver resists the urge to shrug it off; she won’t answer him, so it must be bad news. It’s surely bad news. She’d say so if it was good news. She turns up the volume as loud as it will go, so that it hurts Oliver’s ears. He needs a cigarette badly, but his pack is in the changing room with the rest of his clothes. He wonders if his Ma has any still hidden around the house, but she certainly won’t answer him now. If she hears him at all.  
“Please!” He begs, over the chaos unfolding over the radio.  
“For God’s Sake, Oliver, I haven’t heard of any, but that doesn’t mean there haven’t been!”  
“Thanks, Ma,” he says, relief deflating his knees. He hits the kitchen chair hard, his father sitting down next to him, as they bend their ears toward the wireless; listening to the worst broadcast it had probably ever aired.

 _I’m still not sure what’s happened,_ a woman is saying, received pronunciation not hiding the tremor in her voice. _There’s a lot of destruction around, a lot of rubble- we’re relying on eyewitnesses here, and most of them are- excuse me, sir, are you alright to talk- no, that’s- yes, thank you. What did you see?  
\- Right. _ A firm voice says, and Oliver’s Da sits up straight.  
“That’s Shacklebolt,” He says, under his breath.  
_Clearly, we have a major situation here and we’re trying to establish the exact timeline of events. I would urge citizens to stay away from the Ministry building. The basic facts as we can confirm them are as follows- I just want to be clear from the outset that there were no Ministry casualties. No-one working for the Ministry on an administrative basis has been killed. No visitors on Ministry business- such as apparition licence renewal- have been killed. We have had a few injuries in both of those groups of people, but nothing life threatening. This is obviously very good news-  
_ “Oh my God,” Oliver says, head falling into his hands. “My God, my God,”  
_\- and we should be thankful. Now, the basic facts- oh, thank you- A group of underage Wizards, including Harry Potter, left Hogwarts today and flew to the Ministry. We are as yet trying to determine the reasons for their departure. They entered the Ministry and proceeded to the Department of Mysteries, whereupon they were accosted by- yes, by members of the Terrorist group known as Death Eaters. These individuals seemed to have been waiting for the group, and a short battle ensued. The young Wizards were joined by some Aurors and others, and I believe there were some fatalities within this group, who have yet to be named. Most of the people involved in the events in the Battle of Mysteries have been taken to St. Mungos, and their families have been notified. However, a group of wizards, including Harry Potter and the escaped Bellatrix Lestrange, managed to make their way to the foyer- where we are standing now- and there- Well. There, it would appear that the Dark Wizard known as Lord Voldemort, who was assumed dead until this afternoon, manifested himself. He proceeded to duel with Professor Albus Dumbledore, erstwhile headmaster of Hogwarts- a duel which he willingly forfeited. He has escaped, along with Lestrange. Both Professor Dumbledore and Mr. Potter have left the premises and have been taken to a secure location. We would ask that their privacy is respected at this time, it’s clearly quite a shock. We would also ask that citizens refrain from panicking. We would advise people to stay at home this evening until we give an all-clear. Hogwarts will be placed under very strict security protocols, and the students there are perfectly safe.  
\- But You-Know-Who has returned.  
\- Yes._

Oliver’s Ma stands up.  
“I’m putting the kettle on. Do you want tea?”  
“Yes, please,” Brian says. Oliver nods.  
“I’m going to get changed.” He says. “I left my clothes in Puddlemere. I won’t be a second.”  
By the time he gets back the kettle is boiled and his Ma has the mugs out. He goes upstairs to change and shower, wonders if it’s worth smoking out the window and decides against it. He lights up as he’s going down the stairs, takes a deep drag and feels his lungs expand.  
“Put that out,” His mother says, half-heartedly. He shakes his head and sits down at the table.  
“Well, at least give me one, then,” She says, and he hands her a cigarette as she gives him his tea. Brian doesn’t smoke and never did, but he doesn’t say anything to them as they sit there, letting the kitchen fill up with smoke. He finishes his tea and the cigarette at the same time, and begins another. The radio repeats the same noises and the same story told by different people, again and again. No names are ever mentioned apart from the famous ones.

“Why were you so worried about fatalities?” His Da, asks, eventually. “We don’t have any family in the Ministry.”  
“We have Cathy.”  
“Cathy left work last month to have Gwendolyn.”  
“I have friends who work in the Ministry.”  
“A girlfriend?” His mother asks, looking at him, as he smokes and shakes and lets another cup of tea go cold in front of him. “You looked about ready to head to London yourself. You were screaming yourself hoarse.”  
“No, I wasn’t.” Oliver says. His Da puts a hand on his arm again.  
“You were.”  
“It’s not a girlfriend, it’s just a friend.”  
“Please don’t lie to me, Oliver, I’m not here to be lied to.”

He takes a deep breath and looks at his parents who love him, and who have always loved him, and who are not the types to throw people out into the new warzone that is the outside world.

“I have a boyfriend.” He says, watching the way his Ma’s face stays impassive and his Da’s falls. “For about two years. And he works in the Ministry.”  
“Jesus, Oliver!”  
“Ollie, I…”  
“I know. I’m sorry. This is how it worked out.”  
“Why are you sorry?” His Ma asks, sighing. “God, I knew you were too little trouble to be true. There’s always something. Jesus, Oliver. Jesus.”  
Brian says nothing, takes a few deep breaths. Oliver transfigures the empty flowerpot on the table into an ashtray, knocks the excess of his cigarette, takes another long, long drag, watches them both without saying anything for a while.  
“Well. Why didn’t you say anything?”  
“It’s illegal, Ma. You know now; you’re. Whatever. You’re implicated, I suppose.”  
“You didn’t think we’d mind?”  
“You do mind a little bit.”  
“Well… alright, yes, I suppose I do mind, a little bit.”

“What’s his name?” Brian asks. Oliver winces. His parents would know the Weasleys well enough to have a chat to; they have talked about the whole Percy thing before, in front of him, and what they’ve said hasn’t been flattering.

“I, eh. You have to promise not to say anything to anyone at all ever in your lives, even if it becomes legal tomorrow and there’s marriage and- yeah. You have to promise.”  
“Jesus, Oliver, we promise, there’s no need to be so dramatic about it!”  
“Yes, there is! You have to go to that prison in Wales if you’re caught and they take your wand for six months and write a note in your file and there’s this monster of a woman teaching in Hogwarts at the moment who’s very powerful and she wants people to go to Azkaban for it! And all we’re doing is eating chips on the beach!”  
“I sincerely hope that after two years going out you are doing more than eating chips on the beach,” Brian says, in response to all that, and Oliver has to smile.  
“I’d be content with that,” His Ma mutters under her breath. “We promise, anyway, Duck. Who is it?”  
“Don’t lose the head.” Oliver says. “It’s Percy.”  
“ _Je-sus.”  
_ “Percy _Weasley?”_    
“Is _that_ why he’s left Molly the way she is?”  
“She’s miserable about him, the poor thing.”  
“I don’t know why he did that. I wish he hadn’t,” Oliver says, uncomfortable. “That’s not why.”

He stubs his cigarette out and decides to wait before taking another so that they don’t think he’s an addict, or anything.

“Two years.” Brian says. “I married your mother after three.”  
“We were older than you, though. Quite a bit older.”  
“Not that much older.”  
“Not like I can get married, anyway,” Oliver says, and Brian’s face does that thing where it gets screwed up and sad. “Sorry. I know you wanted me to.”  
“Nonsense. We’ll just use another excuse for a party. It’s not your fault.”  
“We’re relying on Anna to get married now?” Oliver’s Ma says, and despite the objective horror and misery and unfairness of it all and the day at large, they do laugh at that.

It takes weeks and weeks of things being done, precautions being taken, idle, bored, empty hours, staring out of windows and letting the cold glass touch his forehead, for the initial shock of it to wear off, like waking up from a nightmare only to discover that it’s all still real. Oliver finds himself longing for Percy; wants the feel of his skin and the sound of his voice- the voice he uses when it’s only the two of them, which is different to the voice he uses out and about. Oliver much prefers it. It’s groggy in the morning, softer, strangely cadenced. But the Ministry is just a mess at the minute, everyone working 12 hour days, at least, and according to the snatches of information that Oliver has been able to get a hold of, Percy’s sleeping in the office. He’s had a letter- short, to the point- I’m perfectly all right, on the floor where I was nothing major happened, it’s all right- but nothing major. Oliver sits at home or sometimes goes to the pub with some of the guys from the team, meets up with Alicia, who’s looking for a housemate, and goes to his parents’ to welcome Anna home. There’s nothing majorly out of routine about it, which is the scary thing. You-Know-Who has properly returned, and all that’s happened is a few leaflets being delivered. Omar, who’s been hanging around the pubs the few times Oliver’s been out, is cagey and unsure of where to go. He wants to get out before the really bad stuff starts to happen. He’s muggle born, but prominently so, so that means he’ll either be the last or the first to be taken away. According to him, anyway. Oliver’s not good with the history that everyone seems to be so au fait with; he supposes he should have paid more attention in class.

Oliver is lying very still on the couch, staring at the ceiling, and wondering what he should do. It’s midnight. The curtains are drawn against what has been a very blue night. There’s a crack, suddenly; Oliver propels himself from the sofa, drawing his wand; but it’s only Percy. Relief floods Oliver; Percy’s presence is enough to make it all better. For a while, anyway. He is compelled to embrace him, tightly, burying his head in his shoulder. Percy is very tall, and even though lately he’s started to stoop a bit more than when he was in school, it’s still no contest between them.  
“I missed you so much!” Oliver says, even beyond smiling. He squeezes his eyes shut. “God, Perce, there for a minute I thought you were- well, it doesn’t matter. You’re here now.”  
Percy’s standing stiffly; though he reciprocated the hug at the start; Oliver could hear his deep breaths, the quick beat of his heart.  
“I can’t stay here,” Percy says, in his head boy voice. Oliver blinks, breaks away and steps back.  
“Perce?”  
“No, it’s- this is all wrong, I see that now.” Percy says, and “I think we should- I’m- this is not what we should be doing.”  
“What are you doing?” Oliver asks, feeling out of his depth. “If you haven’t got long, we should-”  
“Jesus, Oliver, would you listen? We should, I think, it would be better if we went our separate ways. I don’t think this will help us in the years to come.”  
“What?”  
“I think that this is going to be harmful, over the next few years, for both of our careers. So. I’m putting them first.”  
“You’re leaving me.”  
“I- yes. I am.”  
“Please don’t do this, Percy, please don’t do this. Don’t, don’t. What did I do? I’m so sorry. I’m sorry, OK? Please don’t do this.”  
“No- no, you- don’t make this hard. Come on, now. You didn’t do anything. Really. This is just- I mean, I feel that this whole thing, well, it’s run its course, hasn’t it? Two years? For something that really- well, it’s just an accident of circumstance, really, don’t you agree? It’s been- well. I just dropped by to tell you that. And- I’ve moved flats, so don’t try and find me. Really. I’m doing you a favour, you know.”  
“But I love you. You love me. You said. You said in the last letter you wrote.”  
Percy looks away, at the floor. He shakes his head slightly. Oliver feels like he’s scored some sort of a point, but then he looks Oliver dead in the eye. His hand shakes a little.  
“I lied.” Percy says, his voice strained. “I don’t. I never did.”  
“You _fucking cunt of a liar._ I _know_ you. You _did.”_ Oliver says, reaching for Percy, trying to get him to look him in the eyes, but it’s too late, and he doesn’t take the bait, only bite his lip.

“Sorry.” Percy says, hoarse, and he apparates away.

What do you say to that? Where has he gone? Why did he say that? What made him do this?  
Oliver looks around his empty flat. Nobody to go drinking. Nobody can help him with this. All the pubs are closed. There’s no drink in the house. If he goes to his parents’ now they’ll be asleep and he’ll frighten them. Oliver sits on the couch and stares at the wall in front of him, eyes wide. He fights the urge to laugh, covering his mouth with his hand. There’s nothing to do.  
There are a lot of questions to ask, clearly, but there are no answers on hand; there were no clues, Oliver hasn’t done or said anything; he can’t even remember what was said, it’s all a panic coloured smear in his mind. Something about careers, about things just being ended, about- about how Percy never loved him, about how he was lying all that time- which physically _stings._ And now- it that true? Was he really that good of- or maybe Oliver just wanted it to be true, and made up all those moments when- surely not. He’s not an observant person, but he’s surely not _that_ fucking ignorant.  
He looks around again, and then he does laugh. It turns to tears pretty quickly; which is only to be expected, really.

His Ma makes him tea the next afternoon, his Da still being at work.  
“It could be a Ministry thing, pet,” She says, watching as he ignores the sandwich in front of him. “They’re getting very strict these days. He could be getting cagey.”  
“Why wouldn’t he _say_ that, then?” Oliver wails, but quietly, so that Anne won’t hear from upstairs.  
“I don’t know, chicken.” His Ma sighs.  
“I can’t think of a single thing I did wrong” Oliver says. “We were supposed to outlast that kind of thing.”  
“From what I can gather, Oliver, that kind of outlasting might be more difficult if you’re not as… bloody-minded as you are. You know, not everyone is as goal orientated as you are.”  
“He has a twelve-point plan on how to be Director of Foreign Policy by the time he’s thirty-five.” Oliver says, miserably. “And he’s a step ahead of where he thought he would be. Oh _God,_ it’s _me,_ I don’t suit the _politics.”_  
“Well.” Oliver’s Ma says, sympathetically. “He sounds like you’re better off without him, doesn’t it?”  
Oliver could choose to wail _he made me better and like I was worth something outside of Quidditch,_ which would be the truth, but he’s been dwelling on this in front of his Ma like a child for long enough, so instead he nods, and sadly tries to eat the sandwich. Maybe a bit ambitious; he doesn’t taste anything and it feels like damp sawdust in his mouth.  
“How long did you train for today?”  
“Six hours,” He says.  
“I’ll make you another sandwich.” His Ma says, and he’s a good son. He eats the sandwiches.

He ends up listening to Anne explain the exact mechanics behind different counter-curses for four hours, which, although edifying, is not exactly the best use of his time. He could be lying on his couch, alone and sad, instead. That seems like a more reasonable thing to do, given the circumstances.

He’s getting ready to leave, looking for his jacket and wand, when his Da floos home.  
“What’s wrong, Ollie?”  
“I’ve been dumped because I’m not politically expedient.” He says, dejectedly. “So I’m going home to smoke.”  
“You really shouldn’t smoke.” His Da sighs. “Those potions are really nasty. And you’ll get yellow teeth. Hang on, would you, though? There’s something I’d like to talk to you about.”  
“Brian?” His Ma calls from the kitchen. “You home?”  
“Hello, Mary. We’re having company for dinner, is that alright?”  
“The more the merrier. I suppose Oliver’ll stay on as well, so.”  
“He will.” Brian says, looking straight at him. Brian doesn’t generally tell him to do things. Oliver stops looking for his jacket.  
“Who’s coming?”  
“Actually,” Brian begins, but is interrupted by somebody else flooing in.  
“Lord,” Oliver says, in surprise. “Hello, Professor.”  
“Oliver.” Remus Lupin nods. “You can call me Remus, now, we’re out of school and all that.”  
“Oh, really,” Oliver’s Ma says, holding open the living room door with her hip and drying a plate. “This again. Good to see you again, Remus.”  
“If only it were under better circumstances,” Remus says, with a small smile. His moustache is still intact, but his hair is a little shorter than Oliver remembers. Otherwise, he looks abjectly terrible; like he hasn’t slept or eaten since Oliver saw him last. His clothes are old; they smell musty and his pants are too long. They’re somebody else’s. There’s a bandage on his arm when he waves at Oliver’s Ma, and it’s fresh.  
“How are you?” Oliver asks, politely, not really sure of what else to say.  
“I’ve been better. What about you?”  
“Um.” Oliver says, because he’s not really sure what to say here. Lupin looks like he’s been through a literal war and only barely made it out the other end. Oliver’s only been dumped. “Mixed bag.”  
“Right.” Brian nods. “I need to go ask Mary something. Dinner’ll be ready soon. I’ll shout.”  
Lupin smiles and nods; it seems to take an effort. Oliver says something bland in the affirmative, and Brian leaves the room.  
“Look,” Lupin says, going to the window, and looking out at the uninspiring field bordering the uninspiring garden. “I need to ask you some questions.”  
“Me?”  
“Just a few. Have you been keeping up with your duelling practise?”  
“We have to, for training.” Oliver says. Officially this is not allowed but none of the officials were born in Scotland. Puddlemere think it’s a good idea.  
“Good. And are you any good at keeping secrets?”  
To that, Oliver frowns slightly.  
“Well, I’ve had a fair amount of practise, there, haven’t I?”  
Lupin wheels around, colour in his cheeks.  
“Lord, I had completely forgotten. You have a stake in the outcome of this war, don’t you? Right.”  
“We all have a stake in the outcome of this thing, Prof- Remus. But you could say that I have more- yeah. You get the idea. Why? Is there something going on? Can I help?”  
“I think so.” Lupin says, sitting down in the window seat, on his hands. “Mm. I think so. You were awfully good at duelling, you know.”  
“Thanks. I was only average.” Oliver says.  
“No, I don’t think so. Anyway. I- there’s- unrelated. Have you seen Percy lately?”  
“He dumped me yesterday.” Oliver says, through a grimace. Saying it out loud feels like thumping a bruise. “Do you want news for his mum? He’s healthy and not hurt, but he’s sleeping at the office.”  
“I- Jesus, Oliver, have you been together for all this time?”  
Oliver just clamps his teeth over a lip that is treacherously wobbling, and nods while examining the mantelpiece closely. One day gone and suddenly the world is a terrible place.

Lupin explains the idea behind the- well, Oliver doesn’t want to call it a team, exactly, or a club- but it’s somewhat similar to both of those as well.  
“It’s called the Order of the Phoenix” Lupin says. “Or just the Order for short. We had it during the first war too. Most of the original members are dead, but we have a few still around- your dad, for example, and I suppose we count Frank and Alice, although personally I don’t think… but anyway.”  
“You’re recruiting me for suicide missions.” Oliver says.  
“I wouldn’t say that they’re _all_ suicide missions.”  
“But the last group all died.”  
“What other options have you?”  
“Wait to be dragged away to fucking Azkaban, I suppose” Oliver says, and then sighs. “No. Sorry, that was uncalled for. Can I get back to you?”  
“You can let your Dad know when you’ve made your decision.” Lupin says. There’s a long silence as Oliver weighs things up in his mind.

“Fuck it,” Oliver says, sighing, wishing his cigarettes were not AWOL in his jacket pocket. “I’ll do it. I’ll join up. Not like I have anything else going on at the minute.”  
“That’s wonderful, Oliver,” Lupin says, as if Oliver’d just got an O in a test or saved a nice goal, instead of signing his life away as a response to ennui.  
“Do you need anyone else?” He asks, the heaviness in his stomach beginning to settle in, he think, for the long haul.  
“Can you think of anyone else?”  
“I’ll get back to you,” Oliver says, glumly.

This isn’t what he wants to do. He wants to play quidditch and go home to- but it doesn’t matter what he wants and he doesn’t think it ever will. Suffice to say that right now, the best vision of his future is one where he is alive and healthy; whether he is happy no longer seems to be a factor in his own life, let alone anyone else’s. His mother calls him in and they go and discuss who’ll be doing DADA after the Summer, seeing as that hag has been removed from her position, and where the nicest local places to get a drink are, and if it’s more or less convenient to live so far away from other people. All nice and safe, all Anna-friendly conversation, nothing at all about the war; nothing about why Lupin looks like he’s been shrunk, and nothing about why Oliver excuses himself in the middle of the meal to go sit on the edge of the bath breathing heavily and thinking about what Percy’s face looked like when looked down on from below, or how he would walk into walls in the morning when he hadn’t found his glasses.  

Nothing at all about that.


	3. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally got a woman in here to make things bearable.

Alicia moves in when she gets a call from Oliver Wood, who seems to have let himself go a bit; he hasn’t shaven in a while, anyway. The BBC tell her that five people burned to death in a housefire that police are treating as suspicious; the Prophet says that a family were murdered last night by a terrorist organisation. She pushes the guilt down deep and turns off the radio, shrinking it and stuffing it in her overflowing backpack.  
“I’m off, Mum,” She shouts, to her mother in the kitchen. She gets no reply; breathes a sigh of relief, and apparates away for the final time. No need to cause a scene; but they both know that she won’t be coming home again.

Oliver is at practise when she arrives which is just as well; she gets set up- the radio on the kitchen counter, the food into the fridge, her clothes into the wardrobe and the duvet onto the bed. She doesn’t own that much; but now that she’s moved in, it takes up space. It’s neat. She takes out a textbook and begins to study, the radio mumbling softly in the background- George Michael. Her Dad gave her this radio, cliché as it may be, and wherever he is now, she’s glad that she has it. She told him about her change of address on the phone last week, and he wrote it down. So hopefully he’ll remember. The kitchen is kind of small. She wonders when it’ll start feeling just like- her kitchen. Oliver’s late coming home. It’s nearly half-seven; she’s lost track of time studying again. Great. Heaving herself to her feet she starts to cook the dinner, but it’s hard and she’s tired and…

No, she has to keep some level of dignity going, no matter how studenty her life becomes; so she has to keep going and make the dinner. The news says that a ship is on fire in Greece, and she wonders briefly if this whole thing has spread there; but then she remembers that it will go to Italy before it goes anywhere, what with the whole thing happening there. Not Greece. Not everything is a sure sign of worldwide collapse and it’s important to remember that. Anyway, in four months she’ll be a healer, with this accelerated course, and then she’ll be able to help. That’s the goal. Keep it in mind. The news ends and more music comes on- a girl band, the new one, that they’re all mad for. She wonders, if she slipped away to the Muggle world- because she could, she knows a lot about them, she could just not be a witch anymore- would she be safer, or would they look for her just the same? The whole thing is a nightmare, a mess, a horror show; and sometimes she wants to just slip away. Katie says she should stop reading the newspapers and listening to the news. She’ll be able to help when she’s got her cert; right now, she’s powerless. Alicia wants to be able to agree and abide by this logic, but knowledge is power. That’s what her dad always says, knowledge is power, if you know what’s going on you’re much more likely to be able to get the most out of the situation. Or, you know, escape alive; stay observant, etc. Constant vigilance, like the imposter guy teaching them DADA in sixth year always said.

Oliver doesn’t use this kitchen very often, or else he is very clean when he does use it; she’s not sure which. She’s inspecting the fridge when he pops into the room, and his face lifts when he sees her.  
“Alicia! You’re home!” He says. They embrace, and she smiles up to his face.  
“Hello,” She says. “I’m making pasta, if you want some.”  
“I love pasta. Adore it. Please.”  
“No problem.” She smiles. She puts away her study stuff and turns down the music. “How are you, anyway? How’s the team?”  
“The team’s fine,” Oliver says. “Felipe was saying that he thinks he might retire soon. So I might get to play a few games.”  
“Wow,” Alicia says. “That’s soon.”  
“Well… I mean. It’s been what, three years? About average, I guess.”  
“Still.” She says, chopping tomatoes to make a sauce. “It’s good. I’m glad. Any chance of getting an old friend a few tickets if it does come to pass?”  
“So long as you don’t mind people assuming you’re my girlfriend, I can get you pretty good tickets.” Oliver nods. Alicia is reminded of Oliver’s lack of pushiness around this area; she never feels like he’s going to do something as monumentally stupid as fall in love with her and then blame her when she doesn’t like him back. Which is a relief. It’s not something that she can say of many of the guys she knows.  
“A radio!” He exclaims, now, noticing it for the first time. “A _muggle_ radio!”  
“I got it from my dad,” Alicia says. “I like this music better.”  
“I don’t know anything about muggle music,” Oliver says, examining the knobs on the radio with interest, messing with the tuning and then quickly fixing it, turning the volume up and down. “What power is this running on?”  
“I charmed the batteries to turn light into energy,” Alicia says absently, pouring balsamic vinegar and salt into the sauce. “It’ll never run out of power.”  
“That’s handy,” Oliver says. “So? How did it go with your mother?”  
“Glad to see the back of me. Didn’t say goodbye. Thank God.”  
“She’s your mum, Alicia.” Oliver says. He looks a little shocked- well, it’s all easy and good for him. Alicia’s been round to Oliver’s house; she’s met his parents. They’re perfectly lovely people.  
“Listen, can you not do this?” Alicia says, sighing, turning around so that she’s facing him as he examines the radio.  
“Shit. Yes. Sorry. Sorry.” Oliver nods. “Got it.”  
“Dinner’s nearly ready.”  
“Smells amazing. Here, I’ll set the table. I went out and bought more cutlery yesterday, I keep losing my own.”  
Alicia watches as wipes up the tomato pulp from the counter before pulling down two plates and setting the table neatly. He seems at odds in the environment, standing too stiffly and smiling too late.

Alicia dumps the pasta onto plates, unceremoniously, trying not to let it bother her too much; it’s been quite a long time since she’s seen him last, after all; and there’s a war on.  
“So? How’s everything been?”  
“Right, so.” Oliver says. “I have something to ask you, hun.”  
“Oh?”  
“Mm. Look. I know- this is a horrifically irresponsible thing for me to do but you’d kill me if I didn’t ask you.”  
“It’s about the war.”  
“Yes. There’s this group that I’m working with. And we need more people.”  
“And you want me to join? Who else is in it?”  
“I can’t tell you that,” Oliver says, looking at her as if she’s crazy. “All sorts. You’d be surprised.”  
“Right. Is it dangerous?”  
“We’re at war,” Oliver says, looking at the pasta he hasn’t touched. “Yes, of course it is. That why- well, you’re nearly a healer now, and we need people like you, who don’t go. You know. Fucking running into curses for the craic.”  
“Fred and George?”  
“I’m saying nothing at all about it. If you want to come with me this evening, then we can talk more there, where- listen, if this gets out- I assume you know the rest.”  
Alicia doesn’t, but she imagines that it won’t be pleasant. She nods.  
“It sounds like something I don’t really have a choice in doing or not. You know. Am I supposed to pretend like it’s not happening? It is happening. People are-”  
“Dying,” Oliver nods. “They’re fucking dying.”

And that is the story of how Alicia joins the Order of the Phoenix and is immediately swept off aside from the main group and into the Healers, who go in after the fighting has stopped or wait, as clocks tick loudly, with hot water and fresh bandages, for the injured to come in. She hates the waiting, but at least it’s useful for studying; there’s another girl in her class here, and they study together sometimes, hiding the books beneath shelves when the wounded come in, so as not to make them lose confidence. It’s making her better at healing, anyway. She’s at the top of the class, and she can keep a cooler head than some of the professionals they have in. They are mostly women and mostly young; they sometimes get on well, and sometimes their friends are out; and sometimes their friends die. That is beyond words. They sit on their hands, and let the old emotions of watching and waiting fill them up. Every so often someone comes to ask if they want tea. Alicia is not dispensable, what with her skills; but she gathers pretty soon that Oliver is about as frontlines as they come. She hears him at night through the thin bedroom walls; on the good nights, she only hears the silence that means he’s lying awake. She wonders sometimes what he’s seen and how he is. It can seem sometimes that he’s lost something central. But then, he gets onto the main team, and he plays Quidditch as a full team member and is phenomenal, and she gets to see him play, and gets to see the way the rest of the team congratulate him when they all land; and he seems to levitate on his own joy- all his dreams come true! -for a week afterwards. They have a breathlessly happy evening, that night, as if three fishermen were not found dead, strangled by their own nets. It is as if there had never been a war or anything similar. Alicia knows that afterwards, every night can be like this one- uncomplicated. She throws a cushion at his head and he transfigures it into a soft quaffle, catches it and throws it back to her. She reaches on instinct, the sensation of stopping forward momentum familiar to her palms. He grins and tries to get her to join a team, for real this time, even five-a-side after work- and this is, of course, why she is so fond of him.

He's always polite to The Boy she brings home every now and then, and teases her about it afterwards. He does not bring home girls from his occasional nights out with the team; sometimes he stays out all night but that’s about it. She doesn’t ask. He never asks The Boy his name because he can tell that that is not what Alicia keeps him about for; and it’s not what he is here for, either. Something about war; something about how youth culture is becoming less constrained; something about how they don’t really want to do things like this but she’s so controlled everywhere else; she can grant herself this. No questions from the other bedroom. It can be infuriating.

She graduates. Nothing changes much except for now she has the morning shift at St. Mungo’s. She and Oliver get ice-creams after the ceremony. He seems to move in sad slow motion. She falls asleep on the table. They do not move for a while, staring at each other, mouths dry and straight; it’s exactly at that minute that Alicia understands what this whole thing has done to them both; and that they’re not coming back from it. There won’t be evenings like after the quidditch, at least not at all often. She thinks Oliver is thinking the same. She thinks they probably know each other than they know anyone else, at this stage; whatever happened to him to make him stare like that, it’s in the past. And she’s here now.

“They’ve finished up. We have one dead and one injured. Looks like a crucio to the spine, which can be nasty. Ellie, get this place sorted, there’s more walking wounded coming in. Alicia and Freida, you can both come with me.” The head healer, Irene, says.  
Alicia nods and heaves herself to her feet, regretting that she won’t be here for Oliver when he arrives in, possibly with blood streaming into his eyes or something else dramatic. Frieda, her dark hair plaited severely, sighs. She hates field work; especially when there’s somebody dead; she hates dealing with the families. Sometimes the families don’t know that the dead person was even in the order to begin with. Those are Alicia’s least favourite trips. Usually Frieda complains a lot about being asked, but today they’re all exhausted. Alicia can barely talk. She doesn’t want to have to make this trip. She doesn’t want to know what the Hell a crucio to the spine looks like. She wants the war to go away.

Well, the war has very different idea, she knows. She navigates around the hastily transfigured beds with difficulty- the room is not fit for purpose at all- picking up a flask of tea, just in case, from the sideboard, and then makes her way to the contact who they’ll apparate side-along with to the battlefield. Alicia is surprised to see that it’s Tonks- this was a fairly important outing then- waiting impatiently beside the door.  
“Oh!” Tonks says in surprise. “Alicia, I’m not sure if this is-”  
“Come on, Tonks,” Irene says, shaking her head. “Hurry up Frieda, will you? Crucio to the spine is serious.”  
“It’s just-”  
“Ah, Frieda. There you are. Come on, then. Let’s go.”

The battlefield smells of copper and damp grass. Alicia lands in damp soft grass, mud up to her shins; it has been raining, but now there’s nothing but a freezing wind, sharp on her exposed cheeks and hands. She fumbles for her wand, looking to illuminate the area. She’s beaten to it by Tonks, casting defensive spells first and then lighting up. She’s transformed her face again, into a blonde, sharp-featured woman. Alicia blinks; she looks a little like Oliver’s mother. The gale blows again, and Frieda loses her hat to the wind.  
“Over there. Alicia, I really think you should hold back.”  
“Alicia’s needed for the spine,” Irene says. “She’s my calmest healer, and I need steady hands. Frieda, apparate the body out.”  
Alicia begins to move forward through the mud, water rising up to her ankles every time she tries to step forward again. It’s slow, dark, work; she can’t make out who either of the bodies are until she’s quite close.  
“Jesus, no,” She says, when she can see one of the faces. It’s one of Oliver’s teammates- Monica, Alicia thinks her name is; she’s still, not breathing. From the way she’s lying she can tell it was a plain old killing curse; at least it was quick and painless. How will she tell Oliver? He’ll be devastated.

And then she gets close enough to see the other one; and that’s much worse.  
“Come on, Alicia!” Irene says, slapping her arm. “It doesn’t matter who it is- stop that moaning now, he needs you to be in control.”  
She can’t say anything; the sight of him like this, with dark muck covering the side of his face where he’s lying and blood on his forehead has taken her words, at least for the minute; she needs to focus, and so turns off the part of her that’s screaming- Oliver, Oliver! – and rolls her sleeves up. He’s not going to die here, not if she can help it.  
“The spine is hot,” She says. “That’s not usual, for a crucio. Do you think they combined it with something else?”  
“Hot, did you say? Let me feel- you’re right.”  
Irene runs her wand over him, makes a few mumbling noises, and her expression clears. Oliver makes strange noises below them- he’s choking on his tongue- Alicia fixes that- and Irene nods.  
“They’ve attached it to a stupify.” Irene nods. “So it makes it worse- the pain- but it’s limiting the- well it’s complicated- he’s thrashing around like this, they think it’s funnier this way. He’ll be alright, is the thing. We have to get him to the dry. Frieda, are you done?”  
“Nearly,” Frieda’s accent sounds comically strong. “Now I am.”  
Alicia turns and sends the blue sparks up- all clear- and gripping Oliver’s wrist tightly, she apparates back to the ward.

“Get out of the way! Out of the way!” She shouts, crouched on the ground, Pietà-like, his head on her lap, lolling, jerking. There’s a smash, footsteps, a pair of arms bringing him up, but for a split second there he was limp, and such a wall of fear wells up that she is momentarily blinded. But she has to get over this; she’s useless to him if she stands here crying and wringing her hands. There’ll be time for that later. She snaps back- they’re casting counter spells against the heat and the stupify, and then Irene taps his head, and he goes under.  
“Usually,” Irene explains to the healers around her, all of whom are newly-qualified, “We just knock people out if they’re still in pain after 15 minutes, because after that it’s dangerous, but before that, it’s best if it can work through the system naturally. It’s very uncomfortable to wake up after being put under during an attack, and sometimes it can be dangerous for the muscles. But under these circumstances, the possibility of harm to the mind was greater than that of problems with the muscles.”  
“Will he be OK?” Alicia is afraid to hear the answer.  
“He should be.” Irene nods. No congratulations or commendations or anything else. “You always fight a crucio last. You saw, here, we did the stupify first. I can’t believe that they don’t teach you these things anymore. This is the first one we’ve had so far, but in the last war they did this kind of thing all the time. A crucio to the spine can kill you, if you don’t get to it in time. We need to do more work on why that is, but obviously it’s difficult to find volunteers.”  
Irene used to teach new healers, before their ignorance bored her, and she moved on to specialty counter-cursing.

Alicia goes to Oliver’s parents’ and before she opens her mouth, his mum has the kettle on. His dad stands up as soon as he sees her- she realises that she has his son’s blood all over her hands and mutters to herself about her own stupidity. Couldn’t even clean her hands. She’s shaking from the adrenaline.  
“Was it quick?” He asks her.  
“He’s not dead!” She exclaims. They both mutter things under their breaths, heads falling in a similarly relieved way; the tension begins to seep out of the room. “He got a cocktail to the spine, is the thing.”  
“Is he alright?”  
“He probably will be. He hasn’t woken up yet. He’ll have to take the week off. After that, probably. It was crucio and stupify, you know, so… not too much cause for long-term worry. Just letting you know that he’s out of action.”  
“I told you this would happen.” Mary says, softly.  
“What, and we’re to stand back and let them kill him?”  
“There was no need to introduce him to- to show him the way in! He could have been killed.”  
“Better this than going vigilante, Mary.” Brian stretches his hands out on the table, palms up.  
“A crucio! Brian, our son is in hospital, after a _crucio!_ ”  
“I’m- I’m actually needed, back- so if you- I’m actually just going to go.”  
To her surprise, Mary forces a mug of tea into her hands and forces her to stay until it’s finished.  
“No news about that ex of his, is there?” Brian asks- for all his defence of what Oliver’s doing, Alicia thinks, he looks awfully shaken.  
“Niamh?” She asks, because that’s the last girl she remembers Oliver being with- even as she says it she knows it’s not Niamh. Mary rolls her eyes.  
“Yes, good luck with getting his friends to tell you any news on this front, Brian.” She sighs. “He is alright, Alicia?”  
“Like… generally?”  
“Well, we know he’s not alright at this exact moment, dear.”  
Alicia nods, and finishes her tea, scalding her tongue slightly, thinking about the question. She supposes that the answer seems to be _no,_ but relative to everyone else fighting, he’s about normal.  
“It’s been a hard couple of weeks. We lost some- we lost some friends. Jenny Bell, you know, Katie’s sister. Yesterday. But otherwise he’s been good.”  
“I’m sorry,” Brian murmurs, staring into his mug.  
Alicia does really have to go.  
“It’s what it is.” She says. “Someone has to do it.”  
“I just wish we’d done it right the first time.”

She’s not sure if it was supposed to be a joke or not; she laughs politely anyway, thanks them for the tea, which has helped a little, and disapparates, ending up helping out with the tail end of the crisis- bandages, bruises, panic attacks. Oliver is lying very still on the couch in the living room. Molly Weasley is in there, trying to hand out ham sandwiches to everyone, but even though she’s got three sets of knives going, the demand is greater than the supply. Alicia starts methodically boiling the kettle and pouring out tea; boiling and pouring, boiling and pouring until she looks up and the room is mostly empty but for a few people milling around, talking in hushed voices. Oliver hasn’t woken up yet, which is good, but she’s going to have to get him awake for apparating him home. He should be in hospital, maybe even a speciality ward. But that would raise too many questions, so he’s going to be stuck at home, reading and listening to the muggle charts, and he’s going to be insufferable by the end of the week. Not even counting the fact that this might affect his quidditch; in the long term, it certainly will; but when it comes to the sport, she knows that he only ever thinks in the short term, in how things will go this season, and never further than that. He once played a whole match with a broken arm, she remembers. She takes one of the leftover mugs and heats it up again, cupping it in her hands, which are still dirty, and wanders over to see how he’s doing. Breathing normally. Not so rigid. Colour back in his cheeks. Still covered in muck, which to be fair was not unusual of itself. It was so close. She touches his wrist, and he’s still warm, and it’s a miracle. She’s suddenly too tired to breath.  
“He’ll be alright.” Irene says, wandering over from where she had been talking to a tall man Alicia doesn’t recognize. “You were useful today.”  
“Thanks,” Alicia says. “Can you help me wake him up?”  
“You’re going home, are you?”  
“No, there’s this club that we’ve been wanting to go to for a while now,” Alicia says, before remembering who she’s talking to and blushing. “Yes. I’ll take him home.”  
“Watch for his temperature.”  
“I remember.” Alicia nods. “Thanks.”  
It takes a while to get him awake, and when he is, he’s totally out of it, keeps blinking and turning his face away from the lights in the room.  
“Take him home.” Irene says. Alicia only nods, and without another word, she apparates to their bathroom. Good move. Oliver stays still for a minute and then heaves into the toilet. It’s not like he’s never thrown up with her there before, of course; the opposite. And she makes the sounds she usually makes and strokes his back in the exact same way. She transfigures one of the towels into a stretcher, floats him to his room- and then she realises that he’s still caked in mud, and she can’t put him to bed like this, unresponsive as he is; so they go back to the bathroom, and- mercifully, his cloak and jeans were think enough to make it that the muck is just in his hair and on his face and arms. Alicia sponges it off, trying not to cry. He tries to say something but it’s like he can’t concentrate long enough to form the words; and then she brings him up to his room- again- and puts him in loose pyjamas- he should be in a hospital, she thinks, he should be in a hospital. His bed is a double one and she lies down next to him, on top of the sheets, and closes her eyes, falling asleep almost instantly.

He’s awake when she comes back from work, later, sitting up in bed, staring into his hands as though he’ll find something there.  
“Thank you, Alicia,” he says, voice shaky, not quite able to meet her eyes.  
“It was no problem, Oliver. It was my job. I’m sorry about your friend.”  
“I didn’t know her that well,” Oliver says, hoarse. “She was nice, though.”  
Alicia checks him over, and he doesn’t seem to be in immediate danger. They drink tea and eat toast. She’s so tired. The Order have told them that neither of them are needed until the next week- they have time to breath. Potentially, time to go out and meet other people, if they want. Alicia might go and meet The Boy, but at the minute she can’t countenance it.

“I have something to tell you that you should probably know.”  
“Oh?” Alicia says. “Don’t stretch yourself.”  
“It’s important.”

Out of everything he could have told her, she is not expecting the actual story.  
“And he just dumped you, like that?”  
“Yeah.”  
“That’s why you’ve been so sad.”  
“I haven’t been sad.”  
“You’ve been staring out of windows and smoking whenever you have a free moment.”  
“Right.” Oliver says. “I suppose. I was hoping that everybody thought the world was a grey and terrible place.”  
“Well, at the minute it is.”  
“I. God. Thanks for taking it so well.”  
“It’s a really big thing to have hidden, Oliver.” Alicia says, closing her eyes momentarily. “You know, it’s nearly a lie.”  
“It _was_ a lie. I was lying. I’m so sorry, Alicia.”  
She looks at him, and she thinks of him- shit, she’s thinking of him differently; of course she is, some vital fact of his life has been revealed to her, and it means that he’s in pain. Of course she’s looking at him and his actions, his words in a new light. The poor thing. Which is what he doesn’t want, of course, her pity, her sorrow- but it’s not like he can help that, is it. She can’t help but feel sorry for him- especially as every so often his hand will kind of jerk, due to the curse, and she can’t fix that, either.

Earlier today, she heard bad news about the muggle currency- something horrible has apparently happened. Her dad sounded very stressed indeed over the phone, and he hadn’t long to talk, but he said that he was glad she was called; and she believes him. It’s nice that the worst day in a decade (apparently) for them has to do with nothing more than some economics or something. The Prophet had an obituary for Monica- a small one, died in a flying accident, apparently- and today is an easy day, a comparative breeze. The radio is playing a sad song that she doesn’t recognize; she’s left it on in the kitchen and now that it’s quiet in here, she can hear it dimly.

“It’s not getting any easier.” Alicia says, pensively. “You know, they said it’d get easier.”  
“What, growing up?” Oliver laughs. “I don’t think they were planning on us being guerrilla fighters trained to kill people when they told us that.”  
Alicia laughs, too; but she hates the way that Oliver talks about killing people. She knows that it cuts him up; God, she hates having to leave the bodies of Death Eaters on the ground and not help them herself; she’s left so many people to die in pain, and even though she knows- it’s a war, it’s a fucking _war,_ with all that that word implies, and people die, and soon that might be her, but _Jesus she’s killed people._ Maybe Oliver is right; maybe the only way to get over that is to try and laugh about it, but she finds that the words just won’t form in her throat. 

 She misses Katie and Angelina a lot. She wonders how they’re getting on. They don’t have time to chat like they used to. She thinks she’s seen Angelina at a few Order meetings, in the other room, and obviously, they went to Jenny Bell’s funeral. But asides from that she’s-

“I mean, I’m fine.” Oliver says. “It just gets lonely sometimes.”  
“Maybe you need to think about this in tactical terms, you know,” She says. “We don’t know why he left you. After this is all over, maybe, you can-”  
“Don’t.” He interrupts, gently. “Please, don’t.”

She sits in a café and takes another drink of the tea she’s ordered. Tea in these places is never as good as you can make it at home. She’s waiting around after her shit, looking for something to do that isn’t shopping. She listlessly turns the pages of a Prophet. There’s nothing in it, as usual. She’s bored. She’s tired of being bored. Oliver’s annoying her. She needs time for herself. There’s nowhere safe. A bomb could go off here at any time, and everyone knows it. The skies are so grey and she’s just exhausted, and there’s more to do tonight, more people to certify dead, and more people to try and save. Sometimes she wonders if this is sustainable. How long more can they take this? She’s read her history- Wars take years and years, sometimes long ago, they used to take decades. So Alicia has to believe that eventually this will slow down to something more manageable. There’s nothing more to do than the work in front of her and even that is sometimes too much, or too little. Sometimes she thinks it’s both. At the beginning, maybe, it wasn’t enough, and she felt frustrated that she wasn’t helping as much as she could- but if she had given her all, all the time, that’s not how it works either; there’s a balance that she’s found, now. Not that that makes it any easier, particularly. The word “Balance” implies that, an ease, but she’s found out that it isn’t quite the case. Still, best apprenticeship in the world. She’ll be a good healer by the time this is all over, if she’s not dead by the end. She finishes her tea and sits for as long as she can get away with. Eight found dead in the Thames; but not in London, further north: A quiet little town, rich, a good place to raise your kids, a good place to grow up. Nothing like this has ever happened there before. The bodies have not yet been identified, and they never will be, probably. It’s been up to the Order to fill in a few blanks.

Anyway she arrives home and Oliver’s dad has been hit by a muggle car in Glasgow.  
He’s left her a note, somehow keeping it together to write down what’s happened; clearly he’s not home. A stupid way to die. She’s not sure what to do now. They won’t want her back at his house. There’s four hours until she has to leave again for The Order, so she better tell them that Oliver won’t be there tonight, either- and then she’ll tell Oliver that he’s not needed. Jesus, a _car_ , that’s horrible.

“Oliver’s dad’s after being hit by a car,” She tells Mrs. Weasley, who seems to be in charge of personnel.  
“Ah no,” Mrs. Weasley says. “Is he OK?”  
“He’s Dead.” Alicia says- if the war has done anything, it’s taken the need for those cushioning euphemisms away- easier to say it straight.  
“I knew Brian.” She mutters. “This is terrible, he was such a nice man. God, a car. How is Oliver? And Mary?”  
“I don’t know, he left a note, I called to say he won’t be in this evening. But they were close and Oliver’s been pretty bad, lately, so I wouldn’t imagine he’s great.” There’s something strange about telling her that; she doesn’t know that it’s her own son that’s a cause of a lot of Oliver’s ennui; it occurs to Alicia again that this is a load of bullshit.  
“Right, well.”  
“I’ll be in later.” Alicia says, not bothering to say goodbye.

“I told them. You’re not needed tonight.”  
“No, fuck it Alicia, I can do it!”  
“Looks like it.”  
“No need to be such a bitch! This is more- it’s more _fucking important_ than-”  
“Oliver, come on, hun. We can do without you, this once.”  
“ _Alicia._ ” He says. She opens her arms. He shudders, a whole body-shake.

She works and works and works.

He’s not better. He stays at home when he’s not at work or Order, smoking and listening to music. He doesn’t read the paper.  
He doesn’t do much. Neither of them do. It makes her want to laugh, sometimes; the two of them, wrapped up in themselves, living in the same flat.

He’s doing very well at Quidditch, incongruously. Puddlemere win their league; they’re bumped up a notch, which means his pay is, too. She’s pretty sure he’s saving it all- at this stage, he never has to work again, which is good. He pretends like she doesn’t notice the tremors, and she plays along. He’s not even trying to hide them anymore. He’s playing on borrowed time.

That Summer, they go to that wedding, even though Oliver complains profusely in the weeks leading up to it.  
“Oh come on,” Alicia snaps. “There’s no way he’s going to be there. Come for Fred and George, anyway, they’re forever complaining about how they never get to have friends over anymore. It’ll be good craic.”  
“Right.”  
“It’s been a long time, Oliver. It’s alright to be- you know, to have a good time. Anna went camping last week, and you were happy for her, weren’t you?”  
“Don’t patronize me, Alicia,” He sighs, but she’s made some inroads, and he wearily opens the wardrobe in his room.  
“I need new dress robes.” He says.  
“Wear your kilt.”  
“I suppose I could.”  
“You should!”

Of course, the wedding goes to shit halfway through, but who cares; Alicia finds that she can just separate the two halves of it, and she’s very glad that she went. And Oliver was duelling various people in his kilt, a memory which, despite the horror, she will cherish. After a while one’s sense of humour returns, albeit changed, and she’s happy to see it. There’s nothing worse than being a drag, of being unable to lighten up; after all, why else are you fighting? They’re the ones with the senses of humour, the music, the clothes, the ideas. There’s a reason the fights are so violent, the reaction so extreme; they’re terrified of what the country will look like in twenty years or so; after all this is over and they’ve won. Alicia is very sure that they will win, in the long run; but she’d like to be alive to see it, and she’d like for her friends to be able to see it too. That’s the challenge.

Oliver lies on the couch, holding an icepack to his head.  
“He won’t be able to leave, now” He says.  
“Who, Percy?”  
“Yeah. They’ll kill him if he tries. You know. They were watching him closely even when we were together.”  
“Probably.” Alicia agrees. “Well, it’s his own fault.”  
“Totally his own fault.” Oliver sighs. “How does it feel to be living under a totalitarian regime, Alicia?”  
“To be honest, it feels like I’m slightly drunk and I have to go to work while everyone else is lying off,” Alicia says. “That might just be me, though.”  
“Sounds about right.” Oliver nods.

Actually, now that they’re at open war, things are much easier. They work every night and the consequences of detection are much easier to distinguish. Her dad is in better form, too, talking about an uptick in the economy, and a political party in charge, with a bright new leader. He sounds like the future might be alright after all; she wonders how they’ll tell him, if she dies. Probably they’ll say heart attack. Her family are always dying of heart attacks. He’s paranoid about it.

Oliver brings her up to his for Christmas and nobody cries. Alicia brings a mango dessert that is roundly enjoyed. They turn off the news. Oliver tells her the inside gossip about Remus and Tonks.

“Only together cos what?” She says, delighted, sipping wine on the sofa as Anna plays some sort of board game with Mary. “Really?”  
“Yeah, no, I know. So that nobody’d ask any questions. That new law, you know, it’s pretty harsh.”  
“Are you alright?” She asks, softly. “They won’t come looking for you?”  
Oliver looks at her over his own wine and raises an eyebrow.  
“Listen. I haven’t been spreading this rumour. I swear. But you must know what they’re saying about us.”  
Alicia feels foolish. Of course.  
“I just didn’t realise anyone was taking that seriously.” She says, a flush rising in her cheeks. “But anyway, how did Tonks get pregnant, so, if that’s the case?”  
“That’s their business,” Oliver says, shrugging. “I wasn’t going to be like, “but clearly you must like each other some little bit!” because I’m not a cunt. That’d be rude. Anyway, Lupin drinks a fuck of a lot these days, and she’s not exactly dry either.”  
“Oh my God, it makes so much more sense, now, though.” Alicia nods. “I see it.”  
Oliver laughs a little, and takes another sip of the wine. “That was their whole problem.” He says. “Soon as it’s pointed out, it’s hugely obvious.”

She helps Mary with the washing up later, cleaning them in hot soapy water, looking out at the dark wet garden, watching the wet leaves reflect the kitchen light.  
“Thanks for coming,” Mary says, eventually. “I was worried it would be like last year. That was no fun. But it was good. Anna’s happy.”  
“Thanks for having me. I had Christmas with my dad last year but he’s got married and moved in with his other family now, so that- you know, it wouldn’t be great.”  
“Well in that case, I’m even more glad you’re here,” Mary laughs. “Although Oliver tells me you don’t celebrate Christmas, technically.”  
“My parents are Muslim,” Alicia nods. “But I’m not big on the whole Religion thing, I don’t know. I might go back to it one day.”  
“You should.” Mary says. “It’s very helpful, I find. Get you out of the house, at least.”  
“True.”  
They stay in silence a while longer, the water hot against the rubber gloves on Alicia’s hands.  
Oliver is making noise upstairs; Anna is joining in every so often, and then they laugh. Alicia wants to go up and see what they’re doing but she thinks that she better not; they get so little time together, and they must miss each other; let them have their time.

“I see him shaking.” Mary says. “He told me it was going to go away after a while.”  
Alicia says nothing, looks intently at the plate she is cleaning.  
“That’s not true, then.”  
“It shouldn’t get any worse, if he’s sensible about it.” Alicia says. “They don’t hurt. It’s like when you’re cold, you shiver. It’s a nerves thing.”  
“What on Earth does being nervous have to do with it?” Mary asks, faint lines of confusion on her forehead, and Alicia regrets mentioning this at all, and then they’re saved by Anna coming in and asking for some tea.

They go back down the next morning and start to plan an elaborate assault based on unclear information and intelligence that may or may not be compromised, which is not great. But they’re saying that it could be over before next Christmas, and she feels that in the air- the sense of something closing in, the feeling that soon, somebody will do something decisive, something big, and then the corner will be rounded and they’ll see the future that they’re going to have, and it’s either going to be bright or it’s going to be horrifying. She doesn’t know. She thinks they can do it.

_

 

Oliver flies to Hogwarts. He’s never done this before. The main thing on his mind is to get Anna out of any danger she might be in, and then see what’s needed. Those aren’t his orders but fuck that; he’s given them as much as he’s willing for the time being; go get Anna and then see. The castle is brightly lit up; from the sky, he can see strange coloured flames, jets of light; fire on the Quidditch pitch. Find Anna, then see.

He finds her hiding in a half-collapsed corridor, minding some Hufflepuffs with tear-streaked faces, clutching their wands in front of them. She looks set to murder them herself. They’re not too far away from a tunnel leading to Hogsmeade. He’s heard that they’re trying to send as many students there as possible, to take pressure off the battle.  
“Put your fucking wands away,” Oliver snaps at the children in front of him. “What, are you going to curse the cunts? They see wand and they say that you’re fair fucking game. And take off your fucking house colours, don’t you know they’re politics now? Take them off, take them fucking off, tuck your wands up your sleeves and fucking run down the hall and to the left. I’ll clear the way, you just follow Anna. Fucking get a fucking move on!”  
He flies overhead and tries not to shout at them again for crying too loudly as they run. The tunnel is open and manned by a Ravenclaw who used to be on the team, back when he was in school here. She blinks up at him.  
“This for students?” He shouts, and she nods. “How are you going to hide if they come?”  
“Don’t worry about it, I know some charms. They’re not killing the kids that are running away.” The girl says, and Oliver believes her. It’s nice to finally hear some good news; nobody is trying to kill fleeing unarmed children. Right. He may go down to Alicia and see if she needs any help setting up the medical station in the Great Hall. If they knew that she was part of the order all the healers would be dead; they’re taking a risk letting her be part of the neutral team set up.

So that’s where he’s going and he’s doing well, too, nobody’s expecting any curses from above, so he manages to save a few people, until they start to get wise to it and somebody hits his broom, setting fire to the wood at the end. He hopes this will count on the insurance; he doubts it. Goddamn, but that was expensive, and just after he’d managed to get it to really respond… so making his way on foot, then, through a lot of dead bodies and cursing a lot of people- not killing, not unless he has to, anymore. Too much fucking death here, there’s been so much fucking death already and he’ll be damned if he contributes any more than he has to. Knock them out for a day; they’ll wake up either ruling the world or in chains. So keep on moving, slowly, to the great hall.

A barrage of small hexes force him into a small antechamber beside the hall. He’s just about to burst back out all spells fucking blazing when-

“Oliver,” He hears, from behind.  
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Oliver asks, winded. Percy stares back at him, still in a dirty ministry uniform, a bruise forming on his jaw already.  
“I’m so sorry,” Percy says, reaching for him, and Oliver lets him put his hand up to his face, feels the tremor of an extra loud explosion, but does not hear the sound. He wants to stay, hear the explanation, let his heart cool down a bit, but they can’t. They just can’t. Even though Percy’s face has fit right back in to his ideas of what he should be seeing, even though the feeling of his hand on his skin- he had forgotten, he had forgotten, he had forgotten- they can’t do this here. Not tonight, or at least, not now.  
“There’s no time,” Oliver says, and it comes out like more of a whisper. “I saw your brothers here. Go on, go.”  
“Later, I promise. Later,” Percy says, and Oliver can’t stand to watch him leave like this.  
“Be careful!” He shouts, like the words tear themselves out of his chest.

Alicia’s too busy to talk- but he sees Omar and they stick together, and then when the ceasefire is called they go together to pick up the bodies lying around the grounds.  
“You heard about Fred Weasley?” Omar asks. Oliver hasn’t, but he knows what he means, and they news feels like a kick to the spine. His first thought, absurdly, is of Percy; of how Percy must feel, and not of George, but that comes a split second later. He wishes he could feel worse; but he’s picking gravel out of a fifteen-year old’s face so that her brother won’t be too scared when he sees her; there’s a numbing effect to that that works as well as any alcohol. They bring her in, and lie her down and the usual cries are raised; he wishes he was deaf, so he doesn’t have to hear it.  
“Fucking shit, they got Lupin.” Oliver says, quietly. He hopes the ceasefire will last; the fight’s gone out of him completely with this; and him with a baby at home. Omar begins to pray; he doesn’t kneel. There’s no room. Alicia is nearby and he meets her eye; she shakes her head and then looks down at the person she’s tending to, her white uniform already stained red. The Weasleys are standing near the centre of the room. He can’t bear to look at them, to listen to them; he can’t stand this at all. Eventually Omar gives up. He doesn’t pray in English, but even Oliver can tell that he hasn’t finished the prayer, but rather trailed off mid-sentence. They look at each other and head out.  
“At least it’ll be over, after this,” he says, as they carry a woman up the front steps into the castle.  
“That’s true,” Oliver nods.

It’s during the second half, during the frenetic duelling, that it happens. Oliver is an excellent fighter, and ruthless when he has to be, but he’s tired, he’s making stupid mistakes, and he’s driven into a classroom that’s already seen some fighting. Somebody else is still in here- it’s not an order member- he’s surrounded- he’s fucking surrounded- he raises his wand-  
“ _Crucio!”_ He hears, from two different places at once- one hits his abdomen, the other his lower back, and then everything goes sideways, and the two of them run out of the room, and then that’s it.

 

Alicia is going around classrooms with Percy Weasley, leading a group of unhurt volunteers to pick up any bodies or wounded people that might have been forgotten during the initial ceasefire. Percy bursts into tears sometimes, or has to hold himself up for a minute against the wall, but otherwise he’s fine, and he knows this school better than most. He hasn’t lost the capacity for speech and he’s not actively bleeding. They need him to do what he’s good at, which is telling people what to do and where to do it. They’ve done most of the classrooms now. One more, and she’ll go back to the healer’s tent and he’ll probably go to his family.  
“You’re living with Oliver,” He says, hoarse. “I saw in the Prophet Sports Section.”  
“I know about you two,” She replies, putting her hand on his arm. He stiffens. “It’s alright. He told me. He’s here, I don’t know if you saw him.”  
“Not since- God, not in hours.” Percy says, step faltering slightly.  
“Last I saw he was- oh, here we are. Fuck. Lupin’s office.” Alicia checks the list, and yes, this is the last one.  
“I always think of it as his, as well.” Percy says softly. “His wife-”  
Alicia shakes her head, and he sighs deeply.  
“Well,” he says, and pushes open the door.

When they go in first, Alicia isn’t sure if this is the right room at all, but the window’s in the right place. It’s smashed to bits, glass jagged in the frame. She steps forward, avoiding the chairs in her way, the dark red streak on the ground in front of the desk- and looking just behind the desk-

 

Oliver knows, in his more lucid moments, that he’s dying. This hazy bleary in out in out sensation, the waves of pain and then of pins and needles, then of nothing at all, the numbness and then the burning in his legs; none of that is good and he can’t imagine anyone is going to find him here in time. He imagined always that he would be more frightened by all this. He’s not scared. Just guilty, a little, that he has to put his Ma through this again. Anna. Did his Da feel the same way? And Percy, he thinks suddenly. Alicia, God, Alicia. But she’s gone, and quickly, same as everyone else, and he lets himself sink under again. Maybe he could fight it, if he knew how, but he doesn’t even know where he’d start.

 

Alicia sees him, wide eyed and very still on the ground. He’d clearly fallen backwards over the table, there, and given his head a knock. She lets out a moan, and then covers her mouth with her hand, unable to move more than just a little. Percy, coming up behind her, stops dead: she can feel the moment he sees Oliver on the ground. He steps around her, and she suddenly sees what Oliver must have; the way his movements change, becoming slowly, more fluid, the way his face is now; so terrible and twisted but also gentle, open. He’s maybe trying to say something, but she can’t make out the words- which doesn’t mean, of course, that she doesn’t understand him. It’s a hoarse open vowel sound, halfway between a cry and a sob. It’s like he can’t close his face; his eyes, his mouth. He makes the sound again, louder, kneels down beside him, takes him up, supporting his head like you would a baby’s.  
“Ol,” He says. “Ol. Oh God. Oh _God, God, God, no. Please no.”_  
At which point Alicia hears Oliver make a sound with his mouth, and then start retching. Percy stares, wide eyed, at Alicia, who lets experience take over, and turns him on his side. Oliver vomits- and then his legs start to twitch. Alicia feels her blood run cold.  
“I know what this is.” She looks around at Percy, who seems bereft without something to actively mourn over, like a child. He doesn’t hear her, or else he doesn’t react to her. “I know what this is. We can’t help this here. I have to- I have to bring him to St. Mungo’s proper. He’ll die otherwise. I’ll be back. Tell them at medical I’ll be back.”  
Percy nods and touches Oliver’s face, steps back, and lets her do what she needs to do.

 

When Oliver wakes up, it’s dark, and he’s in tremendous pain. His Ma is sitting in a chair next to the bed he’s lying in. There are flowers on a bedside table and four more beds in the room. Hospital, he realises. Hospital. He reaches out a hand to his mother, touching her shoulder, and she jumps as if burned.  
“Oliver,” She whispers. “Hang on love, I’ll get someone.”  
But he can’t keep his eyes open and he doesn’t see who she does manage to bring back.

“Not ever?” He says weakly, sitting up in bed.  
“I’m sorry.” The Healer- not one he knows from the Order, but a curses specialist. “I really am.”  
“But- I’m already up and around. I walked to the café just today.”  
The Healer pulls up some diagrams.  
“That’s brilliant, and it’s thanks to your level of fitness that you’re able to do that. But I’d say you needed crutches, did you?”  
“Well- yeah, but only for half of it.” Oliver says, but he knows somewhere that the guy is right; the last crucio event had probably shortened his career by a good few years; and now, he’s here, too weak to walk down a 500 metre corridor without help. “What- is that it, then?”  
“Not at all. You’re fit, you’re healthy, otherwise. We’re putting you in intensive physio, and you should be alright getting around normally with a cane.”  
“A cane?” Oliver says, closing his eyes.  
“You know, you’re lucky. If Alicia hadn’t found you when she did you’d be dead. There are people brought in who’ll never walk again. You have decades before you’ll even have to think about that.”  
“It gets worse?”  
“It’s degenerative. You didn’t know? I thought I said. God, I’m sorry.”

There are lots of things he has to take into account now that he didn’t before. It’s better not to think about it like that, though, and keep on going, one stage at a time. The pain is the worst thing about it, though; it never goes away, sits in the base of his spine, and sometimes flares. Sometimes it flares so badly he can’t see. He’s fainted a couple of times. But he’s still working at it; and looking for ways to fill the time that he doesn’t spend training. Katie’s got in touch with him; she was talking to Alicia who told her the news. Like everyone else, she’s lost all respect for the Prophet, and she’s thinking about setting up her own newspaper- Oliver recalls that she was always good at English. She wants to know if he’ll be a sports writer for her, seeing as she can’t find many people who want to give up a day job for a project that is unlikely to get off the ground. But hey, she says, and then cites examples of Muggle newspapers that go completely over his head. So there’s that.

Asides from that, he’s feeling small. Life has moved on so quickly outside the hospital. They’re forming new governments and beginning to reform things that have needed reforming; there’s a new prison and they’re sending people there; most of the funerals are over now. He’s missed all the ones that matter. There’s already talk of a memorial. There’s already talk of national holidays. The Prophet is already talking about quidditch fixtures. The team all came in to see him and tell him how sorry they were. They’ve got a match next week and a shit goalie; they gave him a lifetime pass for games. It could have been sad but he wasn’t going to let it be; that was a great present and it wasn’t their fault. He should have had some sort of a backup plan, and he’s feeling the loss of flying, but it’s not- it’s not the end of the world. He’d thought it would be harder, but Fred and all the rest. Monica won’t even be able to see the games anymore. It could be worse, it could be worse, it could be worse- he knows Omar feels guilty but you can’t go around blaming yourself for stuff that other people do to people. Alicia’s been in and out as much as her work allows- she says that they’re totally full, and she’s been working double shifts with no overtime. This does not work for her. She spends her breaks drinking tea and watching him try and walk up steps in the physio gym.

The paper says that Percy is not going to be charged with anything because all the new laws that were passed were written by him, but he managed to put them together terribly; none of them are constitutional and so they’ve all been swept aside in one go. Oliver thinks suddenly that maybe Percy wasn’t as estranged from the Order as they all thought he was, and feels guilty. He remembers his face and the way he stood just before it all kicked off during the battle, and misses him. But the Prophet goes on to say that he’s been drafted in by the provisional government to help set up a new civil service; Oliver doesn’t for a moment think that he’s sleeping. When he was upset, he used to work until he couldn’t anymore; and now, with Fred, they’d be lucky to get him to leave the office at all.

It’s late, late enough that visitors have all gone home in this ward. Oliver is restless. He can’t focus on the article in front of him, so he lies down and stares up at the ceiling.  
“Oliver?” it’s Alicia’s voice, soft, so as not to disturb anyone else. “Are you able to come out to the corridor?”  
“I think so,” He calls back, and starts the long negotiation, sitting up, finding his crutches- crutches, still, but it’s getting much easier- and then swinging his legs around, using his arms, finding shoes, and everything else. It takes less time now than it did.

She’s waiting for him impatiently. “I’m still on shift,” She says. “Come on, let’s go.”  
“Go where?”  
“He didn’t tell you? Come on, we’re going to the café.”  
“It’s closed!”  
“I know it’s closed. That’s the whole point. God, I can’t believe he didn’t tell you. This is bad. I wouldn’t take that, if I were you, but that’s just me, I guess.”

Percy’s sitting at a table in the dimly lit café, empty, and Oliver understands, now. Percy stands as soon as Oliver comes in, twisting his hands, looking at him in his pyjamas and crutches. God, give someone some warning; he looks terrible. He looks sick. If he had known, he’d have used the cane at least, not these things, that make him look like he’ll never walk properly again. And he will. Soon, in fact. By next week. He’ll be out of here in six days.

“Oliver,” He says, and he’s not looking fresh either. He needs a holiday, Oliver thinks, half-fondly, but _God-_ he’s missed him so much. He’d forgotten what this felt like, how easy it was.  
“Percy.” Oliver replies, and then goes to sit down at one of the tables because he might be doing better but why push his luck?  
“You look better than the last time I saw you.”  
“I thought I was quite dashing around the first half of the battle, actually.” He says, easily, because you have to laugh about it or you’ll cry, and he’s not a crier.  
“You were. But I saw you- I was with Alicia.”  
“Jesus.” Oliver says, the warmth blooming in his chest suddenly cold. “I didn’t know.”  
“No, I asked her not to tell you.”  
“That’s- why not?”  
“Because you’d be wondering why I didn’t call in earlier, maybe, and I haven’t had any time at all. Just- with work, and… and everything else.”  
“I’m so sorry about Fred, Percy.”  
“You were friends.”  
“God, we’re all so sorry.”  
“Your Dad, as well, I never even sent a card. I’m sorry, about that, about all of that. I had to do it, you know, I had to cut all ties.”

Oliver hesitates. "Why?" He asks.

"I don’t think I can tell you yet. I’m not quite finished. Soon. I’ll tell you soon.”

“How are your family getting on?”  
“Oh, you know. We’ve been crying a lot. George is… I don’t know. Then we’ve got the reporters for Ron and Ginny hanging over us, and Dad’s job isn’t technically around anymore until we get to setting up that department again…”  
“You’re back living there?”  
“Until they’re alright again,” Percy nods.  
Having him here like this, so close, but not able to really touch him, is hard. His voice, his mannerisms; they’re stiff and unfamiliar, as if Oliver is a stranger. As if Oliver doesn’t know exactly what he means by “until they’re alright again”, as if they don’t know each other better than anyone else.  
“I’ve missed you a lot.” Oliver says quietly, and takes the hand on the table. It’s warm. Percy is always warm- how has he gone so long without this warmth, this hand?  
“I’m so sorry.”  
“It’s alright. All forgiven.”  
“I wish you’d think about it a little more.”  
“I don’t have to,” Oliver says. The truth, for better or for worse. Maybe if so many people hadn’t died, this would be a harder decision, or if he could still play; if he wasn’t so aware that this is not something everyone gets, then maybe it would be harder to let things go. He leans forward, feels the answering pressure of Percy’s forehead against his own.

This is not easy; this is not what Oliver had pictured for himself after the war- inevitably, that had been quidditch and nothing more. But things change, and get rearranged, and there’s nothing, no magic or action, that will ever change that. He won’t ever know the future; he won’t ever be in a moment that is not right now. The world is scary and huge, there are uncertainties everywhere we go; and the past is terrible and full of pain, and so we have to assume that the future will be similar, and that’s a burden all on its own. The fear of something new, something different than the present we have right now; a present that is not exactly wonderful. Everyone has their cross to bear, nobody’s fully happy, dead parents or brothers or careers, things we should have done, should have said differently, all informing our present misfortunes.

Get up, look out of the window at a blue grey dusk, at a river that will long outlive you, at the buildings that rise up; or at the flat, the rolling hills, the green, the stars; go fucking read some Keats, go see what you can do, go and wake up, go and open, and never forget them- your friends, your family, the road that you lived on when you were fourteen, the way it was in the Summer and in the Autumn, the ice and the melting tarmac, what the neighbours would say at Christmas. The song on the radio when he said he loved you, when he left you. God, the song on the radio that you listened to when reading the paper after work; go and remember that and let it fill you up, until there is nothing in you but you, and then fix something, try and fix something, try and make something better or less broken, and do it until you think that you’ve done it well. There’s nothing scarier than right now; and this right now is worse than all the rest of the right nows that have come for a while now. But take heart, bonne courage, sí se puede, because you need the world, with its wide arms, and it needs you. Love until you stop; love until your heart wears out. That’ll be enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for sticking with this garbage fire! please leave some kudos or comment or something if you liked it!


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